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THE NEO-PLATONISTS 



CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS 

C. F. CLAY, Manager 

LONDON : Fetter Lane, E.C. 4 




NEW YORK: G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS 
BOMBAY, CALCUTTA, MADRAS: MACMILLAN AND CO. 
TORONTO : J. M. DENT AND SONS, Ltd. 
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THE NEO-PLATONISTS 

A STUDY IN THE HISTORY OF 
HELLENISM 

BY 

THOMAS WHITTAKER 

ii 

SECOND EDITION 

WITH A SUPPLEMENT ON THE 

COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 



CAMBRIDGE 

AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS 

1918 



\ r \ 



»£ 

n 









PREFACE 

TO THE SECOND EDITION 

During the time that has elapsed since the publication of the 
first edition of this work, I have at intervals kept myself in 
contact with the subject; but it was not until lately that I saw 
clearly how the book might receive the completion which from 
the first had appeared desirable. The task that obviously re- 
mained was to give a more circumstantial account of the 
Athenian period of Neo-Platonism. I once thought of doing 
this in a second volume; but it became evident in the end 
that, for the aim I had in view, what was necessary and 
sufficient was a more adequate exposition of Proclus. I had 
never proposed to deal with all minutiae on a uniform scale. 
My purpose was, while not neglecting to give some account 
of the lesser as well as the greater thinkers, to set forth sub- 
stantially the doctrine of the school so as to bring out its 
real originality and its historical importance. Now, for this 
purpose, even Porphyry and Iamblichus, while they must 
always retain an honourable place in the history of philo- 
sophy, are of minor significance. The case is otherwise with 
Proclus, whose name has by general consent taken rank next 
to that of Plotinus as representing the last powerful expression 
of Hellenic thought before it ceased to have any effective 
originality. 

Since the book was written, the publication of improved 
texts has put it in my power to do more justice to the thought 
of Proclus than would have been possible at first. I hope that, 
with the aid of these, I have been able to set before the reader 
an account of his principal commentaries bringing out their 
distinctive features and the new developments by which its 
finished form was given to the great system of philosophy 
initiated by Plotinus two centuries earlier. 



vi PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION 

In the text and notes of the book as it appeared in 1901, 
I have made only slight alterations. The Appendix on the 
outlying subject of Gnosticism, however, I found must be re- 
written in view of recent research. The nature of the modifi- 
cation needed, I have indicated in the Appendix itself in its 
new form. 

T.W. 

February, 1918. 



CONTENTS 



PAGE 

INTRODUCTION • . ix 

CHAPTER I 

GRAECO-ROMAN CIVILISATION IN ITS POLITICAL DE- 
VELOPMENT . 1 

CHAPTER II 

THE STAGES OF GREEK PHILOSOPHY .... 7 

CHAPTER III 

RELIGIOUS DEVELOPMENTS IN LATER ANTIQUITY . IT 

CHAPTER IV 

PLOTINUS AND HIS NEAREST PREDECESSORS . . 26 

CHAPTER V 

THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM OF PLOTINUS ... 40 

1. PSYCHOLOGY 43 

2. METAPHYSICS 53 

3. COSMOLOGY AND THEODICY 70 

4. AESTHETICS 87 

5. ETHICS 91 

CHAPTER VI 

THE MYSTICISM OF PLOTINUS 98 

CHAPTER VII 

THE DIFFUSION OF NEO-PLATONISM .... 107 

1. PORPHYRY 107 

2. IAMBLICHUS 121 

3. THE SCHOOL OF IAMBLICHUS 131 



viii CONTENTS 

CHAPTER VIII 

PAGE 

THE POLEMIC AGAINST CHRISTIANITY .... 136 

CHAPTER IX 

THE ATHENIAN SCHOOL 155 

1. THE ACADEMY BECOMES NEO-PLATONIC . . 155 

2. PROCLUS .157 

3. THE END OF THE PLATONIC SUCCESSION . . 180 

CHAPTER X 

THE INFLUENCE OF NEO-PLATONISM ' . . . .185 

CHAPTER XI 

CONCLUSION 205 

APPENDIX 

I. THE COMMUNISM OF PLATO 216 

II. THE GNOSTICS 218 

III. IAMBLICHUS AND PROCLUS ON MATHEMATICAL 

SCIENCE 225 

SUPPLEMENT 

THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 229 

ON THE FIRST ALCIBIADES 242 

„ „ PARMENIDES 248 

„ „ TIMAEUS 264 

„ „ REPUBLIC 295 

INDEX OF NAMES 315 



INTRODUCTION 

That the history of ancient culture effectively ends with the 
second century of the Christian era is an impression not in- 
frequently derived from histories of literature and even of 
philosophy. The period that still remains of antiquity is ob- 
viously on its practical side a period of dissolution, in which 
every effort is required to maintain the fabric of the Roman 
State against its external enemies. And, spiritually, a new 
religious current is evidently beginning to gain the mastery; 
so that, with the knowledge we have of what followed, we can 
already see in the third century the break-up of the older form 
of inner as well as of outer life. In the second century too ap- 
peared the last writers who are usually thought of as classical. 
The end of the Stoical philosophy as a living system coincides 
with the death of Marcus Aurelius. And with Stoicism, it is 
often thought, philosophy ceased to have an independent life. 
It definitely entered the service of polytheism. In its struggle 
with Christianity it appropriated Oriental superstitions. It 
lost its scientific character in devotion to the practice of magic. 
It became a mystical theology instead of a pursuit of reasoned 
truth. The structure of ancient culture, like the fabric of the 
Empire, was in process of decay at once in form and content. 
In its permeation by foreign elements, it already manifests a 
transition to the new type that was to supersede it. 

An argument for this view might be found in a certain 
"modernness" which has often been noted in the later classical 
literature. Since the ancient type was dissolved in the end 
to make way for the modern, we might attribute the early 
appearance of modern characteristics to the new growth ac- 
companying incipient dissolution. The general falling-off in 
literary quality during the late period we should ascribe to 
decay; the wider and more consciously critical outlook on life, 
which we call modern, to the movement of the world into its 



X INTRODUCTION 

changed path. Thus there would be a perfectly continuous 
process from the old civilisation to the new. On the other 
hand, we may hold that the "modernness" of the late classical 
period does not indicate the beginning of the intermediate 
phase of culture, but is a direct approximation to the modern 
type, due to the existence of a long intellectual tradition of a 
similar kind. If the latter view be taken, then we must regard 
the dissolution of the ancient world as proceeding, not by a 
penetration of new elements into the older form of culture so 
as to change the type, but indirectly through the conquest of 
the practical world by a new power; so that, while ancient 
culture was organically continuous as long as it lasted, it finally 
came to an end as an organism. The new way into which the 
world had passed was directed by a new religion, and this ap- 
propriated in its own manner the old form of culture, bringing 
it under the law of its peculiar type. Thus one form was 
substituted for another, but the first did not spontaneously 
pass into the second. There was no absolute break in history; 
for the ancient system of education remained, though in a re- 
duced form, and passed by continuous transition into another ; 
but the directing power was changed. The kind of "modern" 
character which the ancient culture assumed in the end was 
thus an anticipation of a much later period, not a genuine 
phase of transition. In confirmation of the latter view, it 
might be pointed out that the culture of the intermediate 
period, when it assumed at length its appropriate form, had 
decidedly less of the specifically modern character than even 
that of early antiquity with all its remoteness. 

Be this as it may in pure literature, it is certain that the 
latest phase of ancient philosophy had all the marks of an 
intrinsic development. All its characteristic positions can be 
traced to their origin in earlier Greek systems. Affinities can 
undoubtedly be found in it with Oriental thought, more par- 
ticularly with that of India; but with this no direct contact can 
be shown. In its distinctive modes of thought, it was wholly 
Hellenic. So far as it was "syncretistic," it was as philosophy 



INTRODUCTION xi 

of religion, not as pure philosophy. On this side, it was an 
attempt to bring the various national cults of the Roman 
Empire into union under the hegemony of a philosophical 
conception. As philosophy, it was indeed "eclectic," but the 
eclecticism was under the direction of an original effort of 
speculative thought, and was exercised entirely within the 
Hellenic tradition. And, in distinction from pure literature, 
philosophy made its decisive advance after practical disso- 
lution had set in. It was not until the middle of the third 
century that the metaphysical genius of Plotinus brought to 
a common point the Platonising movement of revival which 
was already going on before the Christian era. The system 
founded by Plotinus, and known distinctively as "Neo-Plato- 
nism," was that which alone gave unity to all that remained 
of Greek culture during the period of its survival as such. 
Neo-Platonism became, for three centuries, the one philosophy 
of the Graeco-Roman world. It preserved the ancient type 
of thought from admixture with alien elements ; and, though 
defeated in the struggle to give direction to the next great 
period of human history, it had a powerful influence on the 
antagonist system, which, growing up in an intellectual atmo- 
sphere pervaded by its modes of thought, incorporated much 
of its distinctive teaching. 

The persistence of philosophy as the last living force of the 
ancient world might have been predicted. Philosophic thought 
in antiquity was the vital centre of liberal education as it has 
never been for the modern world. There were of course those 
who disparaged it in contrast with empirical practice or with 
rhetorical ability, but, for all that, it had the direction of 
practical thought so far as there was general direction at all. 
The dissolution by which the ancient type was broken down 
did not begin at the centre but at the extremities. The free 
development of the civic life both of Greece and of Rome had 
been checked by the pressure of a mass of alien elements 
imperfectly assimilated. These first imposed a political prin- 
ciple belonging to a different phase of culture. To the new 



xii INTRODUCTION 

movement thus necessitated, the culture of the ancient world, 
whatever superficial changes it might undergo, did not in- 
wardly respond. Literature still looked to the past for its 
models. Philosophy least of all cared to adapt itself. It be- 
came instead the centre of resistance to the predominant 
movement, — to overweening despotism under the earlier 
Caesars, to the oncoming theocracy when the republican 
tradition was completely in the past. The latest philosophers 
of antiquity were pre-eminently 

The kings of thought 
Who waged contention with their time's decay. 

And their resistance was not the result of pessimism, of a 
disposition to see nothing but evil in the actual movement 
of things. The Neo-Platonists in particular were the most 
convinced of optimists, at the very time when, as they well 
knew, the whole movement of the world was against them. 
They held it for their task to maintain as far as might be the 
type of life which they had themselves chosen as the best; 
knowing that there was an indefinite future, and that the 
alternating rhythms in which, with Heraclitus and the Stoics, 
they saw the cosmic harmony 1 and the expression of provi- 
dential reason, would not cease with one period. If they did 
not actually predict the revival of their thought after a thou- 
sand years, they would not have been in the least surprised to 
see it. 

More than once has that thought been revived, and with 
various aims ; nor is its interest even yet exhausted. The first 
revival the philosophers themselves would have cared for was 
that of the fifteenth century, when, along with their master 
Plato, they became the inspirers of revolt against the system 
of mediaeval theology that had established itself long after 
their defeat. Another movement quite in their spirit, but this 
time not an insurgent movement, was that of the Cambridge 
Platonists in the seventeenth century, which went back to 

3 ttclKIvtovos apfiovirj Koafiov oKucnrep \\jp7]s kcli to^ov. — Heraclitus. 



INTRODUCTION xiii 

Neo-Platonism for the principles of its resistance to the ex- 
clusive dominance of the new "mechanical philosophy." As 
the humanist academies of Italy had appealed against Schol- 
astic dogmatism to the latest representatives in antiquity of 
free philosophic inquiry, so the opponents in England of 
"Hobbism" went for support to those who in their own day 
had intellectually refuted the materialism of the Stoics and 
Epicureans. Since then, many schools and thinkers have 
shown affinity with Neo-Platonic thought; and, apart from 
direct historic attachment or spontaneous return to similar 
metaphysical ideas, there has been a deeper continuous in- 
fluence of which something will have to be said. 

From about the middle of the nineteenth century, the Neo- 
Platonists, though somewhat neglected in comparison with 
the other schools of antiquity, have been made the subject of 
important historical work. To French philosophers who began 
as disciples of Cousin, a philosophy that could be described as 
at once "eclectic" and "spiritualist" naturally became an 
object of interest. The result of that interest was seen in the 
brilliant works of Vacherot and Jules Simon. For definite and 
positive information on the doctrines of the school, the portion 
of Zeller's Philosophie der Griechen that deals with the period 
is of the highest value. In English, Mr Benn's chapter on 
"The Spiritualism of Plotinus," in his Greek Philosophers, 
brings out well the advance in subjective thought made by 
the latest on the earlier philosophies of Greece. Of special 
importance in relation to this point are the chapters on 
Plotinus and his successors in Siebeck's Geschichte der Psy- 
chologie. An extensive work on the psychology of the school 
has appeared since in the last two volumes of M. Chaignet's 
Psychologie des Grecs. Recent English contributions to the 
general exposition of the Neo-Platonist philosophy are Dr C. 
Bigg's volume in the "Chief Ancient Philosophies" Series 
(Christian Knowledge Society), and Dr F. W. Bussell's 
stimulating book on The School of Plato, which, however, deals 
more with preliminaries than with the school itself. 



xiv INTRODUCTION 

In the later historical treatment of Neo-Platonism a marked 
tendency is visible to make less of the supposed "Oriental" 
character of the school and more of its real dependence on the 
preceding philosophies of Greece. This may be seen in Zeller 
as compared with Vacherot, and in Mr Benn as compared with 
Zeller. Of the most recent writers, M. Chaignet and Dr Bigg, 
approaching the subject from different sides, conclude in almost 
the same terms that the system of Plotinus was through and 
through Hellenic. And, as M. Chaignet points out, Plotinus, 
in all essentials, fixed the doctrine of the school. Whatever 
attractions the thought of the East as vaguely surmised may 
have had for its adherents, their actual contact with it was 
slight. When the school took up a relation to the practical 
world, it was as the champion of "Hellenism" ( EWtjv ht/jlos) 
against the "barbarian audacity" of its foes. On the whole ; 
however, it did not seek to interfere directly with practice, but 
recognised the impossibility of modifying the course which the 
world at large was taking, and devoted itself to the task of 
carrying forward thought and preserving culture. Hence a 
history of Neo-Platonism must be in the main a history of 
doctrines internally developed, not of polemic with extraneous 
systems of belief. At the same time the causes must be in- 
dicated of its failure, and of the failure of philosophy, to hold 
for the next age the intellectual direction of the world, — a 
failure not unqualified. To bring those causes into view, it will 
be necessary to give a brief sketch of the political, as well as 
of the philosophical and religious, movement to the time of 
Plotinus. For the ultimate causes of the triumph of another 
system were social more than they were intellectual, and go 
far back into the past. Of the preceding philosophical develop- 
ment, no detailed history can be attempted. As in the case 
of the political and religious history, all that can be done is to 
put the course of events in a light by which its general bearing 
may be made clear. In relation to the inner movement, the 
aim will be to show precisely at what point the way was open 
for an advance on previous philosophies, — an advance which, 



INTRODUCTION xv 

it may be said by anticipation, Neo-Platonism did really suc- 
ceed in making secure even for the time when the fortunes of 
independent philosophy were at their lowest. Then, when the 
history of the school itself has been set forth in some detail, a 
sketch, again reduced to as brief compass as possible, must be 
given of the return of the modern world to the exact point 
where the thought of the ancient world had ceased, and of 
the continued influence of the Neo-Platonic conceptions on 
modern thought. Lastly, an attempt will be made to state 
the law of the development; and, in relation to this, some- 
thing will be said of the possibilities that still remain open for 
the type of thought which has never been systematised with 
more perfection than in the school of Plotinus. 



" On pourrait dire, sans trop d'exageration, que l'histoire 

morale des premiers siecles de notre ere est dans l'histoire 

du platonisme." 

Matter, Histoire Critique du Gnosticisme, 

livre vm. ch. 28. 



CHAPTER I 

GRAECO-ROMAN CIVILISATION IN ITS 
POLITICAL DEVELOPMENT 

Broadly, the political history of classical antiquity almost 
from the opening of the historic period may be described as 
a slow passage from the condition of self-governing common- 
wealths with a subordinate priesthood to the condition of a 
theocratic despotism. This was a reduction of the West to the 
polity of the civilised East. In the old Oriental monarchies 
known to the classical world, the type was that of a conse- 
crated despot ruling with the support and under the direction 
of a priesthood socially supreme. Immemorial forms of it were 
to be seen in Egypt and in the Assyrio-Babylonian civilisation 
on which the conquering Persian monarchy was superimposed. 
In Persia had appeared the earliest type of a revealed as distin- 
guished from an organised natural religion. And here were the 
beginnings of the systematic intolerance at first so puzzling to 
the Greeks 1 . Intolerance, however, did not till later and from 
a new starting-point assume a permanently aggressive form. 
With the Persians, conquest over alien nationalities led to 
some degree of tolerance for their inherited religions. 

The origin of the monarchies of Egypt and of Western Asia 
is a matter of conj ecture. To the classical world they appeared 
as a finished type. The ancient European type of polity was 

1 Herodotus, though he knew and sympathised with the refusal of the 
Persian religion to ascribe visible form to the divinity, saw in the persecution 
of the Egyptian cult by Cambyses and in the burning of Greek temples by 
order of Xerxes, nothing but acts of wanton impiety. They had come to be 
better understood in the time of Cicero, who definitely ascribes the latter to 
the motive of pious intolerance. See De Rep. iii. 9, 14. After a reference to the 
animal deities of Egypt as illustrating the variety of religious customs among 
civilised men, the exposition proceeds: "Deinde Graeciae sicut apud nos, 
delubra magnifica humanis consecrata simulacris, quae Persae nefaria puta- 
verunt, eamque unam ob causam Xerxes inflammari Atheniensium fana 
iussisse dicitur, quod deos, quorum domus esset omnis hie mundus, inclusos 
parietibus contineri nefas esse duceret." 

w. 1 



2 GRAECO-ROMAN CIVILISATION [CH. 

new and independent. It did not spring out of the Oriental 
type by way of variation. In investigating its accessible be- 
ginnings we probably get nearer to political origins than we 
can in the East. We have there before our eyes the plastic 
stage which cannot in the East be reconstructed. The Greek 
tragic poets quite clearly distinguished their own early con- 
stitutional monarchies with incompletely developed germs of 
aristocracy and democracy from Oriental despotism. While 
these monarchies lasted, they were probably not very sharply 
marked off, in the general consciousness, from other mon- 
archical institutions. The advance to formal republicanism 
revealed at once a new type of polity and the preparation for 
it at an earlier stage. That this was to be the conquering type 
might very well be imagined. Aeschylus puts into the mouth 
of the Persian elders a lamentation over the approaching 
downfall of kingship in Asia itself 1 . Yet this prophecy, as we 
know, is further from being realised now than it may have 
appeared then. And, though organised despotism on the great 
scale was thrown back into Asia by the Persian wars, the later 
history of Europe for a long period is the history of its return. 
The republican type of culture was fixed for all time 2 , first 
in life and then in literature, by the brief pre-eminence of 
Athens. The Greek type of free State, however, from its re- 
striction to a city, and the absence of a representative system, 
with other causes, could not maintain itself against the inroads 
of the monarchical principle, which at that time had the power 
of conferring unity on a larger aggregate. The Macedonian 
monarchy, originally of the constitutional type, became, 
through its conquests at once over Greece and Asia, essentially 
an Oriental monarchy — afterwards a group of monarchies — 
distinguished only by its appropriation of the literary culture 

1 ovd' es ySv TrpoirLrvovTes 
api-ovrai ' /SactXeia 

yap SioXuiXev icrxvs. 

ovd' €ti yXuxraa fiporolaiv 

4v <pvXaica2s' XeXvrat, yap 

Xabs eXevdepa ^a^eiv, 

ws eXvd-q £vybv oXkcLs. Pers. 588-594. 

2 is tov airavTa avdp&irwv fiiov. Herod, vi. 109. 



I] IN ITS POLITICAL DEVELOPMENT 3 

of Greece. Later, the republican institutions of Rome, which 
succeeded those of Greece as the type of political freedom, 
broke down, in spite of their greater flexibility and power of 
incorporating subjects 1 , through a combination of the causes 
that affected Greece and Macedon separately. Perhaps the 
imperial monarchy was a necessity if the civilised world was 
to be kept together for some centuries longer, and not to break 
up into warring sections. Still, it was a lapse to a lower form 
of polity. And the republican resistance can be historically 
justified. The death of Caesar showed his inheritors that the 
hour for formal monarchy was not yet come. The complete 
shaping of the Empire on the Oriental model was, in fact, 
postponed to the age of Diocletian and Constantine. Mean- 
while, the emperor not being formally monarch, and the re- 
public remaining in name, the whole system of education con- 
tinued to be republican in basis. The most revered classics 
were those that had come down from the time of freedom. 
Declamations against tyrants were a common exercise in the 
schools. And the senatorial opposition, which still cherished 
the ethical ideal of the republic, came into power with the 
emperors of the second century. What it has become the 
fashion to call the "republican prejudices" of Tacitus and 
Suetonius were adopted by Marcus Aurelius, who, after citing 
with admiration the names of Cato and Brutus, along with 
those of later heroes of the Stoical protestation against 
Caesarean despotism, holds up before himself "the idea of 
a polity in which there is the same law for all, a polity ad- 
ministered with regard to equal rights and equal freedom of 
speech, and the idea of a kingly government which respects 
most of all the freedom of the governed 2 ." Here the demand 

1 That the Romans themselves were conscious of this, may be seen for 
example in a speech of the Emperor Claudius as recorded by Tacitus (Ann. 
xi. 24): "Quid aliud exitio Lacedaemoniis et Atheniensibus fuit, quamquam 
armis pollerent, nisi quod victos pro alienigenis arcebant? at conditor nostri 
Romulus tantum sapientia valuit, ut plerosque populos eodem die hostes, 
dein cives habuerit." 

2 i. 14 (Long's Translation). With the above passage may be compared 
Julian's appeal to Plato and Aristotle in support of his conviction that the 
spirit of laws should be impersonal (Epistola ad Themistium, 261-2). The 
second imperial philosopher, in his satirical composition entitled Caesares, 

1—2 



4 GRAECO-ROMAN CIVILISATION [CH. 

for administrative unity might seem to be reconciled with the 
older ideal; but the Stoic emperor represented the departing 
and not the coming age. 

There was a discrepancy between the imperial monarchy 
on the one hand, potentially absolute, though limited by the 
deference of the ruler for ancient forms, and on the other hand 
the ideal that had come down from the past. The ethics of 
antiquity had never incorporated absolutism. Now the new 
religion that was already aiming at the spiritual dominance of 
the Empire had no tradition that could separate it from the 
monarchical system. Christian ethics from the first accepted 
absolutism as its political datum. The Christian apologists 
under the Antonines represent themselves as a kind of legiti- 
mists, — praying, in the time of Marcus Aurelius, that the right 
of succession of Commodus may be recognised and the blessing 
of hereditary kingship secured 1 . Christianity therefore, once 
accepted, consecrated for the time an ideal in accordance with 
the actual movement of the world. In substituting the notion 
of a monarch divinely appointed for the apotheosis of the 
emperors, it gave a form less unendurable in civilised Europe 
to a servility which, in its pagan form, appearing as an Asiatic 
superstition, had been something of a scandal to the rulers 
who were in a manner compelled to countenance it. The 
result, unmodified by new factors, is seen in the Byzantine 
Empire. The Roman Empire of the East remained strong 
enough to throw off the barbarian attack for centuries. It 
preserved much of ancient Greek letters. In distinction from 
the native monarchies of Asia, it possessed a system of law 
that had received its bent during a period of freedom 2 . But, 
with these differences, it was a theocratic monarchy of the 
Oriental type. It was the last result, not of a purely internal 

most frequently reaffirms the judgments of Suetonius and Tacitus, but not 
without discrimination. Tiberius he sums up as a mixed character, and does 
not represent him as flung into Tartarus with' Caligula and Nero. 

1 See Renan, Marc-Aurele, where illustrations are given of this attitude on 
the part of the apologists. 

2 "The period of Roman freedom was the period during which the stamp 
of a distinctive character was impressed on the Roman jurisprudence." Sir 
Henry Maine, Ancient Law, 10th ed., ch. ii. p. 40. 



I] IN ITS POLITICAL DEVELOPMENT 5 

development, but of reaction on the Graeco-Roman world 
from the political institutions and the religions of Asia. 

The course of things in the West was different. Having 
been for a time reduced almost to chaos by the irruptions of 
the Germanic tribes, the disintegrated and then nominally 
revived Western Empire furnished the Church with the oppor- 
tunity of erecting an independent theocracy above the secular 
rule of princes. This type came nearest to realisation in the 
twelfth and thirteenth centuries. It broke down partly through 
internal decay and partly through the upgrowth of a stronger 
secular life. With immense difficulty and with the appearance 
almost of accident 1 , a new kind of free State arose. The old 
Teutonic monarchies, like the old Greek monarchies, were not 
of the Asiatic type. They contained elements of political 
aristocracy and democracy which could develop under favour- 
ing circumstances. In most cases the development did not 
take place. With the cessation of feudal anarchy, the royal 
power became too strong to be effectively checked. There was 
formed under it a social hierarchy of which the most privileged 
equally with the least privileged orders were excluded as such 
from all recognised political authority. Thus on the Conti- 
nent, during the early modern period, the prevailing type 
became Catholic Absolutism, or, as it has been called, "Euro- 
pean monarchy," — a system which was imitated in the Con- 
tinental Protestant States. By the eighteenth century this 
had become, like the Byzantine Empire or the old Asiatic 
monarchies, a fixed type, a terminal despotism from which 
there could be no peaceful issue. It was destroyed — so far as 
it has since been destroyed — by the revolutionary influence of 
ideas from the past and from without. In England the germs 
of freedom, instead of being suppressed, were developed, and 
in the seventeenth century, after a period of conflict, the 
modern system of constitutional monarchy was established. 
To the political form of the modern free State, early English 
institutions by their preservation contributed most. Classical 
reminiscences, in England as elsewhere, enkindled the love of 
1 Comte at least regarded Absolutism as the normal development, Consti- 
tutionalism as a local anomaly, in European history before 1789. 



6 GRAECO-ROMAN CIVILISATION [CH. I 

freedom; but deliberate imitation was unnecessary where the 
germs from which the ancient republics themselves had sprung 
were still ready to take a new form. From England the in- 
fluence of revived political freedom diffused itself, especially 
in France, where it combined with the emulation of classical 
models and with generalisations from Roman law, to form 
the abstract system of "natural rights." From this system, 
on the intellectual side, have sprung the American and the 
French Republics. 

In the general European development, the smaller con- 
stitutional States may be neglected. The reappearance of a 
kind of city-republic in mediaeval Italy is noteworthy, but 
had little practical influence. The Italian cities were never 
completely sovereign States like the Greek cities. Politically, 
it is as if these had accepted autonomy under the supremacy 
of the Great King. Spiritually, it is as if they had submitted 
to a form of the Zoroastrian religion from which dissent was 
penal. Nor did the great Italian poets and thinkers ever quite 
set up the ideal of the autonomous city as the Greeks had 
done. In its ideal, their city was rather a kind of municipality : 
with Dante, under the "universal monarchy" of the restored 
Empire; with Petrarch and more distinctly with Machiavelli, 
under Italy as a national State, unified by any practicable 
means. Even in its diminished form, the old type of republic 
was exceedingly favourable to the reviving culture of Europe ; 
but the prestige of the national States around was too strong 
for it to survive except as an interesting accident. 

The present type of free State is one to which no terminal 
form can be assigned. In England and in America, in France 
and in Italy, not to speak of the mixed forms existing else- 
where, it is still at the stage of growth. The yet living rival 
with which it stands confronted is the Russian continuation 
or reproduction of Christian theocracy in its Byzantine form 1 . 

1 This epilogue, sketching the political transition to modern Europe, 
seemed necessary for the sake of formal completeness, although the bearing 
of political history on the history of philosophy is much less direct in modern 
than in ancient times. Since 1901 (the date of the first edition), war and 
revolution have changed the aspect of things indicated in the last sentence of 
the chapter. 



CHAPTER II 

THE STAGES OF GREEK PHILOSOPHY 

A.T the time of the Persian wars the civilisation of the East 
was in complexity, specialism, organised industry — whatever 
relative importance we may attach to those features of pro- 
gress — in all probability ahead of the civilisation of Greece. 
The conscious assumption of self-government by the Greek 
cities had, however, been closely followed by the beginnings 
of what we may call speculative science, which was a distinc- 
tive product of the Greek intellect. For this, the starting-point 
was furnished by the empirical observations of Egyptians and 
Chaldaeans, made with a view to real or fancied utility — 
measurement of land or prediction of future events. The 
earliest Greek philosophers, natives of the Ionian cities of 
Asia Minor, and thus on the borders of the fixed and the grow- 
ing civilisations, took up a few generalised results of the long 
and laborious but unspeculative accumulation of facts and 
methods by the leisured priesthoods 1 of Egypt and Babylonia, 
and forthwith entered upon the new paths of cosmical 
theorising without regard to authoritative tradition, and of 
deductive thinking about numbers and figures without regard 
to immediate utility. As early as Pythagoras, still in the sixth 
century B.C., speculative science had begun to show signs of 
its later division into philosophy properly so-called, and posi- 
tive science; the first special sciences to become detached, 
after mathematics, being those to which mathematical treat- 
ment seemed applicable. All this took place before the con- 
tinuous movement of reflective thinking on human knowledge, 

1 This way of putting the matter seems to reconcile the accounts of the 
invention of geometry in Egypt given by Herodotus and Aristotle, which 
Prof. Burnet (Early Greek Philosophy, 1st ed., Introduction, p. 19) finds dis- 
crepant. Herodotus assigns the motive, viz. "the necessity of measuring the 
lands afresh after the inundations"; Aristotle the condition that made it 
possible, viz. "the leisure enjoyed by the priestly caste." 



8 THE STAGES [CH. 

which marks a new departure in philosophy, not its first origin, 
began at Athens. 

The emotion in which philosophy and science had their 
common source was exactly the same in ancient Greece and 
in renascent Europe. Plato and Aristotle, like Descartes and 
Hobbes, define it as "wonder." The earliest thinkers did not 
define it at all. Their outlook has still something very im- 
personal. With them, there is little inquiry about happiness 
or the means of attaining it. When the speculative life has 
been lived by several generations of thinkers, and a self-con- 
scious theory of it is at length set forth, as at the opening of 
Aristotle's Metaphysics, the happiness involved in it is re- 
garded as something that necessarily goes with mere thinking 
and understanding. 

This is the subjective form of early Greek philosophy. In 
objective content, it is marked by complete detachment from 
religion. No traditional authority is acknowledged. Myths 
are taken merely as offering points of contact, quite as fre- 
quently for attack as for interpretation in the sense of the 
individual thinker. The handling of them in either case is 
perfectly free. Results of the thought and observation of one 
thinker are summed up by him, not to be straightway ac- 
cepted by the next, but to be examined anew. The aim is 
insight, not edification. 

The general result is a conception of the cosmos in principle 
not unlike that of modern science ; in detail necessarily crude, 
though still scientific in spirit, and often anticipating the 
latest phases of thought in remarkable ways. Even the repre- 
sentations of the earth as a disc floating on water, and of the 
stars as orifices in circular tubes containing fire, are less re- 
mote in spirit from modern objective science than the astro- 
nomy of later antiquity and of the instructed Middle Ages. 
This was far more accurate in its conception of shapes and 
magnitudes and apparent motions, but it was teleological in 
a way that purely scientific astronomy cannot be. The earliest 
Ionian thinkers, like modern men of science, imposed no teleo- 
logical conceptions on their astronomical theories. 

At the same time, early Greek philosophy was not merely 



II] OF GREEK PHILOSOPHY 9 

objective, as modern science has become. It was properly 
philosophical in virtue of its "hylozoism." Life and mind, 
or their elements, were attributed to the world or its parts. 
Later, a more objective "naturalism" appears, as in the 
system of Democritus. Here the philosophical character is 
still retained by the addition of an explicit theory of know- 
ledge to the scientific explanation of the cosmos. " Primary " 
and "secondary" qualities of matter are distinguished, and 
these last are treated as in a sense unreal. Thus the definite 
formulation of materialism is accompanied by the beginnings 
of subjective idealism. But with the earliest thinkers of all, 
there is neither an explicit theory of knowledge nor an ex- 
clusion of life and mind from the elements of things. 

The atomism of Democritus and his predecessors was the 
result of long thinking and perhaps of much controversy. 
The "Ionians," down to Heraclitus, regarded the cosmos as 
continuously existing, but as ruled by change in all its parts 
if not also as a whole. The Eleatics, who came later, affirmed 
that unchanging Being alone exists: this is permanent and 
always identical; "not-being" absolutely does not exist, and 
change is illusory. The Being of Parmenides, it is now held 1 , 
was primarily the extended cosmos regarded as a closed sphere 
coincident with all that is. Yet, though the conception was 
in its basis physical and not metaphysical, the metaphysical 
abstraction made by Plato was doubtless implicit in it. And 
Parmenides himself evidently did not conceive reality as 
purely objective and mindless. If he had intended to convey 
that meaning, he would have been in violent contradiction 
with his predecessor Xenophanes, and this would hardly have 
escaped notice. The defect of Eleaticism was that apparent 
change received no satisfactory explanation, though an 
attempt was made to explain it in what Parmenides called 
a "deceptive" discourse as dealing with illusory opinion and 
no longer with demonstrative truth. Atomism mediated be- 
tween this view and that of the Ionians by asserting a plurality 
of real beings, each having the characters of the Eleatic 

1 See Tannery, Pour VHistoire de la Science Hellene, and Burnet, Early 
Greek Philosophy. 



10 THE STAGES [CH. 

"being." "Not-being" for the atomists was empty space; 
change in the appearances of things was explained by mixture 
and separation of unchanging elements. The mechanical con- 
ception of the purely quantitative atom, which modern science 
afterwards took up, was completed by Democritus. Anaxa- 
goras, though fundamentally a mechanicist, did not deprive 
his atoms of quality. And Empedocles, along with ideas of 
mixture and separation — explained by the attractive and re- 
pulsive agents, at once forces and media, to which he gave 
the mythological names of Love and Strife — retained some- 
thing of the old hylozoism. Over against the material elements 
of things, Anaxagoras set Mind as the agent by which they 
are sifted from their primitive chaos. This was the starting- 
point for a new development, less purely disinterested than 
the first because more coloured by ethical and religious 
motives, but requiring even greater philosophic originality 
for its accomplishment. 

The new departure of philosophy, though adopting the 
Anaxagorean Mind as its starting-point, had its real source 
in the ethical and political reflection which began effectively 
with the Sophists and Socrates. To give this reflective atti- 
tude consistency, to set up the principles suggested by it 
against all exclusive explanations of reality from the material 
ground of things, and yet to do this without in the end letting 
go the notion of objective science, was the work of Plato. 
Aristotle continued Plato's work, while carrying forward 
science independently and giving it relatively a more impor- 
tant position. One great characteristic result of the earlier 
thinking — the assertion that materially nothing is created and 
nothing destroyed — was assumed as an axiom both by Plato 
and by Aristotle whenever they had to deal with physics. 
They did not take up from the earlier thinkers those specific 
ideas that afterwards turned out the most fruitful scientific- 
ally — though Plato had a kind of atomic theory — but they 
affirmed physical law in its most general principle. This they 
subordinated to their metaphysics by the conception of a 
universal teleology. The teleological conception of nature 
there is good historical ground for attributing also to Socrates. 



n] OF GREEK PHILOSOPHY 11 

The special importance which Plato's Timaeus acquired for 
his successors is due to its being the most definite attempt 
made by the philosopher himself to bring his distinctive 
thought into relation with objective science. Thus, in view 
of knowledge as it was in antiquity, the later Platonists were 
quite right in the stress they laid on this dialogue. 

For the period following upon the death of Aristotle, during 
which Stoicism and Epicureanism were the predominant 
schools, the most important part of Plato's and Aristotle's 
thought was the ethical part. Both schools were, on the 
theoretical side, a return to naturalism as opposed to the 
Platonic and Aristotelian idealism. Both alike held that all 
reality is body; though the Stoics regarded it as continuous 
and the Epicureans as discrete. The soul, for the Stoics as for 
the Epicureans, was a particular kind of matter. The most 
fruitful conception in relation to the science of the future was 
preserved by Epicurus when he took up the Democritean idea 
of the atom, defined as possessing figured extension, resistance 
and weight; all ''secondary" qualities being regarded as re- 
sulting from the changes of order and the interactions of the 
atoms. And, on the whole, the Epicureans appealed more to 
genuine curiosity about physics for itself 1 , though ostensibly 
cultivating it only as a means towards ridding human life of 
the fear of meddlesome gods. If the determinism of the Stoics 
was more rigorous, it did not prevent their undertaking the 
defence of some popular superstitions which the Epicureans 
have the credit of opposing. On the other hand, Stoicism did 
more for ethics. While both schools, in strict definition, were 
"eudaemonist," the Stoics brought out far more clearly the 
social reference of morality. Their line of thought here, as the 
Academics and Peripatetics were fond of pointing out, could 
be traced back to Plato and Aristotle. So also could the 
teleology which they combined with their naturalism. But 
all the systems of the time were more or less eclectic. 

The social form under which the Stoics conceived of 
morality was the reference, no longer to a particular State, 

1 Mr Benn, in his Greek Philosophers, points out the resemblance of 
Lucretius in type of mind to the early physical thinkers of Greece. 



12 THE STAGES [CH. 

but to a kind of universal State. Since the social reference 
in Greek morality had been originally to the " city," the name 
was retained, but it was extended to the whole world, and the 
ideal morality was said to be that of a citizen of the world. 
This "cosmopolitanism" is prepared in Plato and Aristotle. 
Socrates (as may be seen in the Memorabilia of Xenophon) 
had already conceived the idea of a natural law or justice 
which is the same for all States. And in Aristotle that con- 
ception of "natural law" which, transmitted by Stoicism, had 
so much influence on the Roman jurisprudence, is definitely 
formulated 1 . The humanitarian side of Stoicism — which is 
not quite the same thing as its conception of universal justice 
— is plainly visible in Cicero 2 . 

Although Zeno, the founder of Stoicism, was by race half a 
Phoenician, it cannot be said that the East contributed any- 
thing definable to the content of his ethics. Its sources were 
evidently Greek. Down to the end of the ancient world, 
philosophy was continued by men of various races, but always 
by those who had taken the impress of Greek or of Graeco- 
Roman civilisation. 

The same general account is true of the Neo-Platonists. 
They too were men who had inherited or adopted the Hellenic 
tradition. On the ethical side they continue Stoicism; al- 
though in assigning a higher place to the theoretic virtues 

1 See the quotation and references given by Zeller, ii. 2, p. 646, n. 1. 
(Aristotle, Eng. Trans., ii. 175, n. 3.) 

2 See, in De Finibus, the exposition of Cato, deducing from the Stoic 
principles the existence of a "communis humani generis societas" (iii. 19, 62). 
"Bonitas" is expressly distinguished from "justitia" (c. 20, 66); cf. De Off. 
iii. 6, 28. In the fifth book of the De Finibus, Piso goes back for the origin of 
the whole doctrine to the Platonists and Peripatetics. The following sentence 
(c. 23, 65) sums up the theory: "In omni autem honesto, de quo loquimur, 
nihil est tarn illustre nee quod latius pateat quam coniunctio inter homines 
hominum et quasi quaedam societas et communicatio utilitatum et ipsa 
caritas generis humani, quae nata a primo satu, quod a procreatoribus nati 
diliguntur et tota domus coniugio et stirpe coniungitur, serpit sensim foras, 
cognationibus primum, turn affinitatibus, deinde amicitiis, post vicinitatibus, 
turn civibus et iis, qui publice socii atque amici sunt, deinde totius complexu 
gentis humanae; quae animi affectio suum cuique tribuens atque hanc, quam 
dico, societatem coniunctionis humanae munifice et aeque tuens iustitia dicitur, 
cui sunt adiunctae pietas, bonitas, liberalitas, benignitas, comitas, quaeque 
sunt generis eiusdem." 



II] OF GREEK PHILOSOPHY 13 

they return to an earlier view. Their genuine originality is in 
psychology and metaphysics. Having gone to the centre 
of Plato's idealistic thought, they demonstrated, by a new 
application of its principles, the untenableness of the Stoic 
materialism; and, after the long intervening period, they 
succeeded in defining more rigorously than Plato had done, 
in psychology the idea of consciousness, in metaphysics the 
idea of immaterial and subjective existence. Scientifically, 
they incorporated elements of every doctrine with the ex- 
ception of Epicureanism; going back with studious interest 
to the pre-Socratics, many fragments of whom the latest Neo- 
Platonist commentators rescued just as they were on the 
point of being lost. On the subjective side, they carried 
thought to the highest point reached in antiquity. And 
neither in Plotinus, the great original thinker of the school, 
nor in his successors, was this the result of mystical fancies 
or of Oriental influences. These, when they appeared, were 
superinduced. No idealistic philosophers have ever applied 
closer reasoning or subtler analysis to the relations between 
the inner and the outer world. If the school to some extent 
"Orientalised," in this it followed Plato; and it diverged far 
less from Hellenic ideals than Plato himself. 

A certain affinity of Plato with the East has often been 
noticed. This led him to the most remarkable previsions of 
the later movement of the world. The system of caste in the 
Republic is usually said to be an anticipation of the mediaeval 
order of society. Now in the introduction to the Timaeus and 
in the Critias, the social order of Egypt is identified in its 
determining principles with that of the ideal State, and both 
with the constitution of pre-historic Athens, also regarded as 
ideal. Hence it becomes evident that, for his specialisation 
and grading of social functions, Plato got the hint from the 
Egyptian caste of occupations 1 . Thus his ideal society is in 
contact, on one side with the pre-Hellenic East, on the other 
side with the Orientalised Europe of the Middle Ages. By its 
communism it touches modern schemes of reform 2 . 

1 Cf. Arist. Pol. iv. (vii.) 9, 1329 b 23: 6 5t x^P 40 ^* 6 Kara yevos rod 
iroKiTiKov 7rX?70ous e£ AlytiwTOv. 2 See Appendix I. 



14 THE STAGES [CH. 

Mr Benn has remarked that the stages of degeneration from 
the ideal aristocracy to a tyranny, set forth in the Republic, 
are the same as the actual stages of degeneration of the 
Roman State. To this it may be added that in the Laws 
Plato lays down the exact conditions that concurred for the 
establishment of Christianity. The problem is to get a new 
system of legislation received in the projected colony. For 
this he finds that, though citizens from the same State are 
better in so far as they are likely to be more orderly, yet they 
will be too attached to their own laws. There is therefore an 
advantage in beginning with a mixture of colonists from 
several States. The character of such colonists will make the 
task in any case difficult, but the most favourable condition 
is that the ideas of a great legislator should be taken up by a 
young and vigorous tyrant. Generalise a little, putting for 
a single legislator the succession of those who formulated 
ecclesiastical doctrine and discipline, and for a single tyrant 
the consummated autocracy of the later Roman Empire, and 
the conditions are historically given. For there was, in the 
cosmopolitan Empire, exactly that mixture of different in- 
herited customs which Plato desiderates. Add, what is con- 
tinually insisted on in the Laws, that towards getting par- 
ticular precepts enforced it would conduce much if they could 
be regarded as proceeding from a god, and it will be seen that 
here also the precise condition of success was laid down. 

The philosopher even anticipated some of the actual legis- 
lation of the Church. In the tenth book of the Laws, he pro- 
poses a system of religious persecution. Three classes of the 
impious are to be cast out, — those who deny the existence of 
all gods, those who say that the gods take no heed of human 
affairs, and those who say that they can be bought off with 
prayers and gifts; or, as we may put it compendiously, — 
Atheists, Epicureans and Catholics. As, however, the last 
class would have been got rid of with least compunction, the 
anticipation here was by no means exact. And probably none 
of these glimpses, extraordinary as they were, into the strange 
transformation that was to come in a thousand years, had any 
influence in bringing it to pass. 



II] OF GREEK PHILOSOPHY 15 

The Neo-Platonists would have carried out an ethical re- 
form of polytheism in the spirit of the Republic and the Laws ; 
but they did not propose to set up persecution as a sanction. 
On the contrary, they were the champions of the old intellec- 
tual liberty of Hellenism against the new theocracy. One of 
the most Orientalising sayings to be found in the later 
Platonists, namely, that the "barbarians" have an advantage 
over the Greeks in the stability of their institutions and 
doctrines as contrasted with the Greek innovating spirit 1 , 
occurs both in the Timaeus and in the Laws 2 . And Plato's 
attack, in the Republic, on the myths of Greek religion, was 
continued by the Christians, not by his Neo-Platonic succes- 
sors; who sought to defend by allegorical interpretations 
whatever they could not accept literally; or at least, in re- 
pudiating the fables, did not advocate the expulsion of the 
poets. 

It is to be remembered further that in the philosophical 
tradition of antiquity even more than in its general culture, 
the republican ideal was always upheld. Aristotle as well as 
Plato, it is true, was less favourable than the statesmen, 
orators and historians of the great Athenian period to personal 
spontaneity uncontrolled by the authority of the State. But 
of course what the philosophers desired was the supremacy of 
reason, not of arbitrary will. Licence in the city seemed to 
them condemnable on this ground among others, that under 
the show of liberty it paved the way for a tyrant. And the 
later schools, in which philosophy had fixed a sort of official 

1 Quoted by Hitter and Preller (Historic/, Philosophiae Graecae, 7th ed. 
547 b) from the De Mysteriis formerly attributed to Iamblichus (vii. 5, ed. 
Parthey, p. 259): fM€Ta(3a\\6[x.eua del 8id rr\v KaivoTOixiav Kal irapavoixiav t<2v 
"EiXkrivuv oidev 7ratfeTcu...j3dp/3<xpot de fiovifiot rots -^deaiv ovres /cat rots \6yoi.s 
jSejSaiws rots avroh e/jL/nevovcn. 

2 Allowance being made for the point of view, the two aspects of Plato are 
appreciated with perfect exactitude by Joseph de Maistre in his vituperation 
of the Greek spirit. (Du Pape, livre iv. ch. 7.) Plato's "positive and eternal 
dogmas," says the brilliant reactionary, "portent si clairement le cachet 
oriental que, pour le meconnaitre, il faut n' avoir jamais entrevu l'Asie....Il 
y avait en lui un sophiste et un theologien, ou, si Ton veut, un Grec et un 
Chaldeen. On n'entend pas ce philosophe si on ne le lit pas avec cette idee 
tou jours presente a l'esprit." 



16 THE STAGES OF GREEK PHILOSOPHY [ch. II 

attitude, were always understood to be hostile to despotism 1 . 
The Stoics in particular had this reputation, which they 
justified under the early Empire. That the Neo-Platonists, 
although by their time philosophy had almost ceased to have 
a political branch, were still of the ancient tradition, is proved 
by the republican spirit of Julian, who had received from 
them his self-chosen training 2 . In the chiefs of the school 
also, slight indications to the same effect may be discerned. 
This attitude of the philosophers had its importance in pre- 
serving the memory of the higher ideal notwithstanding the 
inevitable descent due to circumstance. And even in the early 
Middle Ages, deriving their knowledge of antiquity as they 
did mainly from a few late compilations, such discussions as 
there are on the origin of society and of government seem 
traceable to reminiscences from the philosophic schools; the 
idea of a social contract in particular coming probably from 
the Epicureans. 

1 Cf. Sueton. Nero, 52: "Liberalis disciplinas omnis fere puer attigit. Sed 
a philosophia eum mater avertit, monens imperaturo contrariam esse." 

2 Julian's refusal to be addressed by the title beairb-rq$ customary in the 
East, did not conciliate the "average sensual man" of Antioch. See Miso- 
pogon, 343 C — 344 a: decnroTrjs elvcu ov </>i)s ovde avexv tovto d/cotfaw, dXXd kclI 
a~yava.KTel$,...5ov\€ijeu> 5' Tj/Aas avayK&fcis dpxovan icai vo/xois. kclitoi irocnp 
KpeiTTOV rjv ovofi&fcadai fxtv <re deinrdTTjv, 2py(p Se eav rjfias elvcu e\evdepovs;... 
d(pels 5e ttjv <tktjpt]v nal robs (jli/jlovs /cat roiis dpxyfTas diro\ib\eKas rjfiuv ttjv irokiv. 



CHAPTER III 

RELIGIOUS DEVELOPMENTS IN 
LATER ANTIQUITY 

Though philosophy at its beginning among the Ionians had 
broken with traditional authority as completely as it has ever 
done since, religion and free speculation did not cease to inter- 
act. In some points, however, their developments were inde- 
pendent. Religious developments independent of philosophy 
were the establishment and the increased attention paid to 
the "mysteries," and the importation of new worships from 
Egypt and Asia Minor. It was also due rather to a new 
development of religion than to philosophy, that more definite 
and vivid beliefs came to be popularly held about the immor- 
tality of the soul and about future rewards and punishments ; 
though philosophers of religious mind sought to impress these 
doctrines along with the general conception of a providential 
government of the universe. In the Homeric poems, the soul 
goes away to the underworld as soon as the corpse is burnt, 
and can never afterwards reappear in the world of living men. 
Yet much later, in the dramatists, the ghost is invoked as 
still having active powers in this world. Here there is perhaps 
a survival of a stage of belief more primitive than the Homeric, 
rather than a development 1 ; but in the notion of definite 
places of reward and punishment there was clearly some 
growth of belief. Perhaps the mythical treatment of immor- 
tality by which Plato follows up his arguments for it on 
speculative grounds, is more a reaction of older religion on 
philosophy than an application of philosophy to religion. To 
the exact truth of the representations given, the philosopher 
never commits himself, but merely contends that something 
of the kind is probably true, as against the imaginations in 
Homer of a world of lifeless shades contrasted in their un- 
reality with the vigour and bloom of life on earth. This side 
1 Rohde (Psyche, i. ) finds evidences of such survival in HesiocL 
W. 2 



18 RELIGIOUS DEVELOPMENTS [CH. 

of Plato's teaching had for a long time not much influence. 
It became influential in proportion as religion revived. With 
Aristotle and the naturalistic schools, personal immortality 
almost went out of sight. The Epicureans denied the immor- 
tality of the human soul altogether, and with the Stoics sur- 
vival of consciousness after death, if admitted at all, was only 
till the end of a cycle or "great year." The religious belief, 
and especially the belief in Tartarus, became, however, in the 
end vigorous enough to furnish one point of contact for a new 
religion that could make it still more definite and terrible. 
And one side of the new religion was prepared for by the 
notion, more or less seriously encouraged, that those who 
partook of the mysteries had somehow a privileged position 
among the dead 1 . This of course was discountenanced by the 
most religious philosophers; though they came to hold that it 
showed a certain want of piety towards ancestral beliefs to 
make light of initiation into the native mysteries. 

Ancient religion and philosophy had not always been on 
such amicable terms as are implied in this last approximation. 
Especially at the beginning, when philosophy was a new 
thing, what may be called a sporadic intolerance was mani- 
fested towards it. Indeed, had this not been so, it would be 
necessary to allow that human nature has since then changed 
fundamentally. Without such germs of intolerance, its later 
developments would have been inconceivable. What can be 
truly said is that the institutions of antiquity were altogether 
unfavourable to the organisation of it. The death of Socrates 
had political more perhaps than religious motives. It has even 
been maintained that serious intolerance first appeared in the 
Socratic school itself 2 . Plato, it is clear, would have been 
quite willing that an ethical reform of religion should be 
carried out by force. After the first collision, however, re- 
ligion on the one side remained unorganised, and philosophy 
on the other side practically free. 

1 Cf. Hatch, The Influence of Greek Ideas and Usages upon the Christian 
Church, Lecture X. 

8 This is the thesis of a very suggestive little book by M. G. Sorel, entitled 
Le Proces de Socrate (1889). 



Ill] IN LATER ANTIQUITY 19 

How far was popular polytheism taken seriously? That it 
was not taken seriously by the philosophers is quite evident. 
Perhaps the Epicureans reacted on it less than any other 
school ; for they conceived of their ethical ideal as realised by 
the many gods named in mythology, and they had no other 
divinities. Their quarrel was not with polytheism as such, 
but with the belief in gods who interrupted their divine tran- 
quillity to interfere in the affairs of mortals. The belief of the 
philosophic schools generally was some form of theism, or, 
as in the case of the Stoics, pantheism, by which the gods 
of mythology, if recognised at all, were subordinated to a 
supreme intelligence or allegorised into natural forces. The 
later philosophers made use of more elaborate accommoda- 
tions. Aristotle had rejected polytheism in so many words. 
Plato had dismissed it with irony. Their successors needed 
those explicit theories of a rationalising kind which Plato 
thought rather idle. For the educated world, both in earlier 
and later antiquity, Cudworth's position is probably in the 
main true, that a sort of monotheism was held over and above 
all ideas of gods and daemons. 

Thus the controversy between Christian assailants and 
pagan defenders of the national religions was not really a con- 
troversy between monotheism and polytheism. The cham- 
pions of the old gods contended only for the general reason- 
ableness of the belief that different parts of the earth have 
been distributed to different powers, divine though sub- 
ordinate 1 . And in principle the Christians could have no 
objection to this. They themselves often held with regard to 
angels what the pagans attributed to gods; or even allowed 
the real agency of the pagan gods, but called them "daemons," 
holding them to be evil beings. The later paganism also 
allowed the existence of evil daemons, and had a place for 
angels among supernatural powers. Perhaps there is here a trace 
of influence from the Eastern gnosis ; though Proclus insisted 
that the name is not peculiar to "the barbarian theosophy," 
but was applied of old to genuinely Hellenic divinities 2 . 

1 Cf. Keim, Cdsus 1 Wahres Wort, p. 67. 

2 See Comm. in Remp., ed. Kroll, ii. 255: ov £eva<bv to ovofia /cat [iapfiapov 

2—2 



20 RELIGIOUS DEVELOPMENTS [CH. 

It is often represented as a paradox that the Christian idea 
of a suffering God should have triumphed over what is sup- 
posed to have been the universal prejudice of paganism that 
to suffer is incompatible with divinity. There is no real 
paradox. Ideas of suffering gods were everywhere, and the 
worship of them became the most popular. The case is really 
this. The philosophers held that absolutely divine beings — 
who are not the gods of fable — are "impassible." In oratorical 
apologies for the Crucifixion and the Resurrection, this philo- 
sophic view of the divinity had to be met. On the other hand, 
the Christians made most of their converts among those who 
were not philosophers. By their mode of appeal, they got the 
advantage at once of a rigorous monotheism such as philo- 
sophy was tending to diffuse, and of the idea that expiations 
could be performed by incarnate and suffering deities, such 
as were believed in over all the pagan world. Exactly with 
this kind of popular paganism philosophy had had its quarrel. 
Of Xenophanes, the earliest explicitly monotheistic philo- 
sopher, it is related that, being asked by the people of Elea 
whether they should sacrifice to Leucothea and lament for 
her, he replied: "If you think her a god, do not lament; if 
human, do not sacrifice 1 ." The same view was taken by later 
philosophers. It was against this, and not against the 
popular imaginations, that such sayings as the well-known 
one of Tertullian were directed 2 . 

Coinciding with the rise of Christianity there was, as has 
lately come to be recognised, a revival, not a decline, of 
ancient religion. The semblance of decline is due to the 
effect produced on modern readers by the literature of the 
later Roman Republic and earlier Empire, which proceeded 
for the most part from the sceptical minority. This impression 

deoaocpias fiovrjs, aXXa /ecu HX&tuv ev KparvXip top "&p,ut)i> koX tt]v *Ipt.v 6eQv 
dyyeXovs elvai cj>T)<riv. 

1 Aiist.Rhet. ii. 23, 1400 b 5. (R. P. 81 a.) EevoQ&vrjs 'EXedrcus epcoruaiv el 
dvbXTi. rrj AevKodea nai dprjvuxriv rj firj, cwefiovkevev, el /xev debv v-iroXa/x^dvovaL, 
fJLT] dp-qvelv, el 5' dvdpwirov, p.7) dveiv. 

2 Tert. De, Came Christi, c. 5: "Natus est Dei Filius; non pudet, quia 
pudendum est : et mortuus est Dei Filius; prorsus credibile est, quia ineptum 
est: et sepultus, resurrexit; certum est, quia impossible." 



Ill] IN LATER ANTIQUITY 21 

has been corrected by the evidence of archaeology. So far as 
there was a real decline in the worship of the old gods, it 
meant only a desertion of indigenous cults for more exciting 
ones from the East. First there appeared the cult of the 
Oriental Bacchus, then of Cybele and of Isis. And all these 
present curious analogies with Christianity. It is an interest- 
ing circumstance that from the Bacchae of Euripides, — which 
is essentially a picture of the uncontrollable frenzy aroused 
by devotion to a lately born son of Zeus, persecuted and after- 
wards triumphant, coming from the East, — many lines were 
transferred to the Christus P aliens 1 . The neglect of the altars 
of the gods spoken of by Lucian may be explained by this 
transfer of devotion. In the dialogue (dewv 'E/c/cX^o-ta, the 
Hellenic gods are called together with a view to the expulsion 
of intruding barbarian divinities, such as those that wear 
Persian or Assyrian garments, and above all "the brutish 
gods of Nile," who, as Zeus himself is obliged to admit, are 
a scandal to Olympus. Momus insinuates that the purge will 
not turn out easy, since few of the gods, even among the 
Hellenic ones themselves, if they come to be closely examined, 
will be able to prove the purity of their race. Such an attempt 
at conservative reform as is here satirised by Lucian no doubt 
represented what was still the attitude of classical culture in 
the second century; as may be seen by the invective of 
Juvenal against the Egyptian religion. Later, the syncretism 
that took in deities of every nationality came to be adopted 
by the defenders of classicism. It is this kind of religious 
syncretism, rather than pure classicism, that revives at the 
Renaissance. The apology not only for the Greek gods but 
for those of Egypt, as in truth all diverse representations of 
the same divinity, is undertaken in one of Bruno's dialogues. 
What makes this the more remarkable is that Bruno probably 
got the hint for his Spaccio delta Bestia Trionfante precisely 
from the dialogue of Lucian just referred to. 

The nearest approach in the Hellenic world to the idea of a 

1 See the notes in Paley's edition of Euripides. The Christus Patiens was 
formerly attributed to Gregory Nazianzen, but is now held to be of much 
later date. 



22 RELIGIOUS DEVELOPMENTS [CH. 

personal religious revelation was made by the philosophic sect 
of the Pythagoreans. The early history of the sect is mainly 
the account of an attempt at ethico-political regulation of 
cities in the south of Italy by oligarchies imbued with the 
philosophical and religious ideas of Pythagoras. These oli- 
garchies made themselves intensely unpopular, and the Pytha- 
gorean associations were violently suppressed. Afterwards 
remains of the societies combined to form a school specially 
devoted to geometry and astronomy, and in astronomy re- 
markable for suggestions of heliocentric ideas. Till we come 
to the Neo-Pythagoreans of about the first century B.C., the 
history of the school is obscure. Its religious side is observable 
in this, that those who claim to be of the Pythagorean succes- 
sion appeal more than other philosophers to the recorded 
sayings of the founder, and try to formulate a minute dis- 
cipline of daily life in accordance with his precepts. The 
writings, mostly pseudonymous, attributed by them to early 
Pythagoreans 1 are in composition extremely eclectic, borrow- 
ing freely from the Stoics as well as from Plato and Aristotle. 
Coincidences were explained by the assumption that other 
philosophers had borrowed from Pythagoras. The approach 
of the Neo-Pythagorean school to the idea of a revelation is 
illustrated by the circumstance that Apollonius of Tyana, to 
whom in the first century a.d. miracles and a religious mission 
were attributed, was a Pythagorean. The lives of Pythagoras 
himself, by Porphyry and Iamblichus, are full of the marvels 
related in older documents from which both alike drew. 
According to Zeller, the peculiar doctrines and the ascetic 
discipline of the Essenes are to be ascribed to Neo-Pytha- 
gorean rather than to Indian or Persian influences. Their 
asceticism — an essentially non-Judaic character — has in any 
case to be explained from a foreign source; and its origin from 
this particular Hellenic source is on the whole the most prob- 
able, because of the number of detailed coincidences both in 
method of life and in doctrine. 

Closely connected with the idea of the cosmical harmony, 
so strongly accentuated in the Pythagorean school, is the 
1 Zeller, iii. 2, pp. 100-3, gives a long list of them. 



ill] IN LATER ANTIQUITY 23 

adoration of the stars thought of as animated beings, which 
became in quite a special manner the philosophic religion. 
This may have been first suggested by the star-worship 
associated with the empirical observations of the Chaldaeans, 
from which the Greek rational astronomy arose. There is not 
much trace of this form of religion in Greek polytheism at its 
first mythological stage. The genuine gods of Greece were 
essentially anthropomorphic. In a passage of Aristophanes 1 
it is even said that the sun and moon are distinctively the gods 
of the barbarians. The earliest philosophers did not treat the 
heavenly bodies as in any special way divine, but regarded 
them as composed of the same kinds of matter as the other 
and lower bodies of the universe. When popular religion 
thought it an impiety on the part of Anaxagoras to explain 
the nature and action of the sun without introducing divine 
agency, the divine agency required was no doubt of an anthro- 
pomorphic kind, — that of a charioteer for example. By Plato 
and Aristotle the divinity of the stars themselves was affirmed; 
and it afterwards became an article of faith with what we 
may call pagan philosophical orthodoxy. It was for the 
philosophers a mode of expressing the teleological relation 
between the supreme Deity and the animated universe. The 
heavenly bodies, according to the theory, were placed in 
spheres to give origin by their motions to the ideas of time 
and number, and to bring about the succession of day and 
night and the changes of the seasons for the good of men and 
other animals. That they might do this, they were endowed 
with ruling intelligences superior to man's and more lasting. 
For the animating principle of the stars, unimpeded by any 
process of growth or decay, can energise continuously at its 
height, whereas human souls, being temporarily united to 
portions of unstable matter, lapse through such union from 

1 Quoted in Blakesley's Herodotus, vol. ii. p. 210, n. 
TP. T) yap ceK-qv-r) %u> wavovpyos r/'Atos, 
vfiiv tiufiouketiovTe irokvv i]5r) xpovov, 
tols (3ap[3apoiai irpodidorov TTjv'EAAdoa. 
EP. IVa tl 5e tovto dpdrov ; TP. otlt) vr\ Aia 
Tj/j.e'is p.kv v/juv ddofj-ev, to^utolctl 5e 
oi fiapfiapoi dvovai. Pax, 406-11. 



24 RELIGIOUS DEVELOPMENTS [CH. 

the condition of untroubled intellectual activity. This theory, 
founded by Plato in the Timaeus, was an assertion of teleo- 
logical optimism against the notion that the stars are products 
of chance-aggregation. As such, it was defended by Plotinus 
against the pessimism of the Christian Gnostics, who — going 
beyond the Epicureans, as he says — regarded the present 
world as the work of an imperfect or of an evil creator. And 
in the latest period of the Neo-Platonic school at Athens, a 
high place was given, among the devotional usages adopted 
from the older national religions, to those that had reference 
to the heavenly bodies. 

A current form taken by this modification of star- worship 
was astrology. Its wide dissemination in Italy is known from 
the edicts expelling the so-called " mathematici " or "Chal- 
daei," as well as from the patronage they nevertheless ob- 
tained at the courts of emperors. Along with magic or 
"theurgy," it came to be practised by some though not by 
all the members of the Neo-Platonic school. Plotinus him- 
self, as a true successor of Plato, minimised where he could 
not entirely deny the possibility of astrological predictions 
and of magical influences, and discouraged the resort to them 
even if supposed real. In his school, from first to last, there 
were always two sections : on the one hand those who, in their 
attachment to the old religion and aversion from the new, 
inquired curiously into all that was still preserved in local 
traditions about human intercourse with gods or daemons; 
and on the other hand those who devoted themselves entirely 
to the cultivation of philosophy in a scientific spirit, or, if of 
more religious mind, aimed at mystical union with the highest 
God as the end of virtue and knowledge. This union, accord- 
ing to the general position of the school, was in no case 
attainable by magical practices, which at best brought the 
soul into relation with subordinate divine powers. According 
to those even who attached most importance to "theurgy," 
it was to be regarded as a means of preparation for the soul 
itself in its progress, not as having any influence on the 
divinity. One here and there, it was allowed, might attain to 
the religious consummation of philosophy without external 



in] IN LATER ANTIQUITY 25 

aids, but for the majority they were necessary. As " magical " 
powers, when real, were held to be due to a strictly "natural" 
sympathy of each part of the universe with all the rest, and 
as this was not denied, on scientific grounds, by the opponents 
of magic, the theoretical difference between the two parties 
was less than might be supposed. It did not prevent philo- 
sophers of opposite views on this point from being on friendly 
terms with each other. The real chasm was between the 
philosophers who, however they might aspire after what they 
had heard of Eastern wisdom, had at heart the continuance 
of the Hellenic tradition, and those believers in a new revela- 
tion who, even if giving to their doctrines a highly speculative 
form, like the Gnostics 1 , yet took up a revolutionary attitude 
towards the whole of ancient culture. 

1 See Appendix II. 



CHAPTER IV 

PLOTINUS AND HIS NEAREST PREDECESSORS 

A name once customarily but incorrectly applied to the Neo- 
Platonist school was "the School of Alexandria." The his- 
torians who used the name were aware that it was not strictly 
correct, and now it seems to be again passing out of use. That 
the Neo-Platonic teachers were not in any close association 
with the scientific specialists and literary critics of the Alex- 
andrian Museum was elaborately demonstrated by Matter in 
a work which is really a History of the School — or rather 
Schools — of Alexandria, and not, like those of Vacherot and 
Jules Simon bearing the same general title, of Neo-Platonism. 
In his third volume (1848) Matter devotes a special section to 
the Neo-Platonic philosophy, "falsely called Alexandrian," 
and there he treats it as representing a mode of thought 
secretly antipathetic to the scientific spirit of the Museum. 
This, however, is an exaggeration. Of the obscure antipathy 
which he thinks existed, he does not bring any tangible 
evidence; and, in fact, when Neo-Platonism had become the 
philosophy of the Graeco-Roman world, it was received at 
Alexandria as elsewhere. What is to be avoided is merely the 
ascription of a peculiar local association that did not exist. 

To the Jewish Platonism of Philo and to the Christian Pla- 
tonism of Clement and Origen the name of "Alexandrian" 
may be correctly applied ; for it was at Alexandria that both 
types of thought were elaborated. To the Hellenic Platonism 
of Plotinus and his school it has no proper application. Plo- 
tinus indeed received his philosophical training at Alexandria 
under Ammonius Saccas; but it was not till long after, at 
Rome, that he began to put forth a system of his own. xAiter 
his death, knowledge of his system, through Porphyry and 
Iamblichus, diffused itself over all parts of the Roman Empire 
where there was any care for philosophy. Handed on by the 
successors of Iamblichus, the doctrine of Plotinus at last 



CH.iv] PLOTINUS AND HIS NEAREST PREDECESSORS 27 

gained the assent of the occupants of Plato's chair in the 
Academy. The one brilliant period of Neo-Platonism at 
Alexandria was when it was expounded there by Hypatia. 
Its last great names are not those of Alexandrian teachers, 
but those of the "Platonic successors" at Athens, among 
whom by far the most distinguished was Proclus. 

The school remained always in reality the school of Plotinus. 
From the direction impressed by him it derived its unity. 
A history of Neo-Platonism must therefore set out from the 
activity of Plotinus as teacher and thinker. Of this activity 
an account sufficient in the main points is given by his dis- 
ciple Porphyry, who edited his writings and wrote his life 1 . 

Through the reticence of Plotinus himself, the date and 
place of his birth are not exactly recoverable. This reticence 
Porphyry connects with an ascetic repugnance to the body. 
It was only by stealth that a portrait of the master could be 
taken; his objection, when asked to sit to a painter, being the 
genuinely Platonic one that a picture was but an " image of an 
image." Why perpetuate this when the body itself is a mere 
image of reality? Hence also the philosopher did not wish 
to preserve the details of his outward history. Yet in his 
aesthetic criticism he is far from taking a merely depreciating 
view of the fine arts. His purpose seems to have been to 
prevent a cult of him from arising among his disciples. He 
would not tell his birthday, lest there should be a special 
celebration of it, as there had come to be of the birthdays of 
other philosophers 2 ; although he himself used to keep the 
traditional birthday-feasts of Socrates and Plato 3 . 

According to Eunapius 4 , he was born at Lyco (or Lycopolis) 
in Egypt. From Porphyry's Life the year of his birth is 
inferred to be 204 or 205. In his twenty-eighth year, being 

1 Porphyry's Life is prefixed to the edition of Plotinus by P. Volkmann 
(Teubner, 1883, 4), from which the citations in the present volume are made. 

2 Cicero treats the direction of Epicurus that his birthday should be 
celebrated after his death as a weakness in a philosopher. De Fin. ii. 31, 102 : 
"Haec non erant eius, qui innumerabilis mundos infinitasque regiones, 
quarum nulla esset ora, nulla extremitas, mente peragravisset." In the last 
two words there is an evident allusion to Lucr. i. 74. 

3 Porph. Vita Plotini, 2. 

4 Vitae Philosophorum ac Sophistarum (Plotinus). 



28 PLOTINUS [CH. 

dissatisfied with the other Alexandrian teachers of philosophy 
whom he frequented, he was taken by a friend to Ammonius. 
When he had heard him, he said to his companion: "This is 
the man of whom I was in search" (rovrov e^rjrovv). With 
Ammonius he remained eleven years. At the end of that time, 
he became eager to learn something definite of the philosophy 
that was cultivated among the Persians and Indians. Ac- 
cordingly, in his thirty-ninth year he joined the expedition 
which Gordian was preparing against Persia (242). The Em- 
peror was killed in Mesopotamia, and, the expedition having 
failed, Plotinus with difficulty escaped to Antioch. At the age 
of forty, he went to Rome (244); where, for ten whole years, 
though giving philosophical instruction, he wrote nothing. 
He began to write in the first year of the reign of Gallienus 
(254). In 263, when Plotinus was about fifty-nine, Porphyry, 
then thirty years of age, first came into relation with him. 
Plotinus had by that time written twenty-one "books," on 
such topics as had presented themselves in lectures and dis- 
cussions. These Porphyry found issued to a few. Under the 
stimulus of new discussions, and urged by himself and an 
earlier pupil, Amelius Gentilianus, who had come to him in 
his third year at Rome, Plotinus now, in the six years that 
Porphyry was with him, wrote twenty-four more books. The 
procedure was as before ; the books taking their starting-point 
from the questions that occurred 1 . While Porphyry was in 
Sicily, whither he had retired about 268, Plotinus sent him in 
all nine more books. In 270, during this absence, Plotinus 
died in Campania. After his death, Amelius consulted the 
Delphic oracle on his lot, and received a response placing him 
among the happy daemons, which Porphyry transcribes in 
full 2 . 

Among the hearers of Plotinus, as Porphyry relates, were 
not a few senators. Of these was Rogatianus, who carried 
philosophic detachment so far as to give up all his possessions, 
dismiss all his slaves, and resign his senatorial rank. Having 
before suffered severely from the gout, he now, under the 

1 V. Plot. 5: £k irpcHTKalpuv Trpo^K-qfxdTwv ras virodecreis XajSovra. 

2 V. Plot. 22. 



IV] AND HIS NEAREST PREDECESSORS 29 

abstemious rule of life he adopted, completely recovered 1 . To 
Plotinus were entrusted many wards of both sexes, to the 
interests of whose property he carefully attended. During the 
twenty-six years of his residence at Rome, he acted as umpire 
in a great number of disputes, which he was able to settle 
without ever exciting enmity. Porphyry gives some examples 
of his insight into character, and takes this occasion to explain 
the reason of his own retirement into Sicily. Plotinus had 
detected him meditating suicide; and, perceiving that the 
cause was only a "disease of melancholy," persuaded him to 
go away for a time 2 . One or two marvellous stories are told 
in order to illustrate the power Plotinus had of resisting 
malignant influences, and the divine protection he was under 3 . 
He was especially honoured by the Emperor Gallienus 4 and 
his wife Salonina, and was almost permitted to carry out a 
project of restoring a ruined city in Campania, — said to have 
been once a " city of philosophers 5 ," — which he was to govern 
according to the Platonic Laws, giving it the name of "Plato- 
nopolis 6 ." The fortunes of the scheme are curiously recalled 
by those of Berkeley's projected university in the Bermudas. 
At the time of this project, Plotinus must have been already 
engaged in the composition of his philosophical books. As 
Porphyry relates, no external demands on his attention, with 
whatever good will and practical success he might respond to 
them, could break the continuity of his meditations, which he 
had always the power to resume exactly at the point where 
he had left off. Of the characteristics of his lecturing, his 
disciple gives a sympathetic picture 7 . He did not care for 
personal controversy; as was shown by his commissioning his 
pupils to reply to attacks on his positions. Porphyry mentions 

1 V. Plot. 7. 2 Ibid. 11. 3 Ibid. 10. 

4 Gallienus tolerated Christianity. He was a man of considerable accom- 
plishments, though the historians do not speak highly of him as a ruler. 

5 This apparently means, as has been conjectured (R. P. 508 f.), that it had 
formerly been ruled by a Pythagorean society. 

6 V. Plot. 12. 

7 V. Plot. 13: tJv 5' 4v t£ X^yeiv rj evdei^is rod vov &xpi tov irpoautrov avrou rb 
0ws eirCKdixiTovTO'i • tpacrpuos fiev b<pdrjvai, koXXLiov 5e totc /xdAicrra. bpu)p.evos ' /cat 
\eirr6s Tts idp&s eireOei kcu, tj TrpaoTTjS dieXafMire kcli to Trpoarjpes irpbs rets epwr^crets 
ideiKwro kcli to cvtovov. 



30 PLOTINUS [ch. 

a case in which he himself was set to answer an unedifying 
discourse of the rhetor Diophanes 1 . The books of Plotinus, 
as we have seen, were not composed on any general plan. 
Porphyry relates that, through a weakness of the eyes, he 
never read over again what he had once written. His gram- 
matical knowledge of Greek remained imperfect, and the 
revision as well as editing of his writings was committed to 
Porphyry, from whom proceeds the arrangement of the six 
"Enneads," — the name the fifty-four books received from 
their ordering in groups of nine. While he worked in this 
irregular way, the character of his thought was extremely 
systematic. He evidently possessed his doctrine as a whole 
from the time when he began to write. Yet in detail, even 
to the very last books, in which Porphyry thought he observed 
a decline of power, he has always something effectively new to 
add. 

In addition to the grouping according to subjects, which he 
adopted for his arrangement of the Enneads as we have them, 
Porphyry has put on record an alternative ordering which 
may be taken as at least approximately chronological. The 
chronological order is certain as regards the succession of the 
main groups. Of these there are three, or, more exactly, four; 
the third group being divided into two sub-groups. At the 
beginning of the second main group also the order of four 
books is certain. For the rest, Porphyry does not definitely 
state that the books are all in chronological order; but, as his 
general arrangement in this enumeration is chronological, we 
may take it that he carried it through in detail as far as he 
could ; and, as a matter of fact, links of association can often 
be detected in passing consecutively from one book to an- 
other. For reading, I have found this order on the whole 
more convenient than the actual grouping of the Enneads. 

When the books are read in this chronological order, the 
psychological starting-point of the system becomes particu- 
larly obvious, the main positions about the soul coming early 
in the series. In the exposition that is to follow 2 , these will 
be set forth first. After Psychology will come Metaphysics, 

1 V. Plot. 15. 2 See ch. v. 



IV] AND HIS NEAREST PREDECESSORS 31 

then in succession Cosmology (with Theodicy), Aesthetics and 
Ethics 1 . A separate chapter will be devoted to the Mysticism 
of Plotinus 2 . For this order of exposition support might be 
found in what Plotinus himself says, where he points out that 
from the doctrine of the soul, as from a centre, we can equally 
ascend and descend 3 . 

Before beginning the exposition, an attempt must be made 
to ascertain the points of contact furnished to Plotinus by 
those nearest him in time. His general relation to his pre- 
decessors is on the whole clear, but not the details. Of the 
teachings of his Alexandrian master, nothing trustworthy is 
recorded. Ammonius left nothing written, and the short 
accounts preserved of his doctrine come from writers too late 
to have had any real means of knowing. What those writers 
do is to ascribe to him the reasoned positions of Plotinus, or 
even the special aims of still later thinkers contemporary with 
themselves. Porphyry, in a passage quoted by Eusebius, 
mentions that Ammonius had been brought up as a Christian, 
but, as soon as he came in contact with philosophy, returned 
to the religion publicly professed. He is spoken of as a native 
of Alexandria; and the name "Saccas" is explained by his 
having been originally a porter (%a/cfca$ being equivalent to 
aa/cKOifiopos). Hierocles calls him "the divinely taught " (Oeo- 
SiBa/cros). Besides Plotinus he had as pupils Longinus the 
famous critic 4 , Origen the Christian, and another Origen. 
With this Origen and a fellow-student named Herennius, 
Plotinus is said to have entered into a compact that none of 
them should divulge the doctrine of Ammonius. The com- 
pact was first broken by Herennius, then by Origen; lastly 
Plotinus thought himself at liberty to expound the master's 
doctrine orally. Not for ten more years did he begin to write 5 . 
Evidently this, even if accepted, does little towards explaining 

1 Roughly, this corresponds to the order: — Enn. iv. v. vi. n. in. I. 

2 See ch. vi. 3 Enn. rv. 3, 1. 

4 The ILepl "Txf/ovs, formerly attributed to Longinus, is now generally 
ascribed to some unknown writer of the first century. See the edition by 
Prof. W. Rhys Roberts (1899), who, however, points out that in its spirit it 
is such a work as might very well have proceeded from the historical Longinus. 

5 Porph. V. Plot. 3. 



32 PLOTINUS [CH. 

the source of the written doctrine of Plotinus, — in which there 
is no reference to Ammonius, — and Zeller throws doubt on the 
whole story 1 , regarding it as suspiciously like what is related 
about a similar compact among the early Pythagoreans. It 
is to be observed that Porphyry does not say that he had it 
directly from Plotinus. 

What is clear is this, that from Ammonius Plotinus must 
have received some impulse which was of great importance 
for his intellectual development. In the class-room of Plotinus, 
we learn from Porphyry 2 , the later Platonic and Aristotelian 
commentators were read; but everywhere an original turn 
was given to the discussions, into which Plotinus carried the 
spirit of Ammonius. This probably indicates with sufficient 
clearness the real state of the case. Ammonius was one of 
those teachers who have the power of stirring up independent 
thought along a certain line; but he was not himself the forma- 
tive mind of the movement. The general line of thought was 
already marked out. Neither Ammonius nor Plotinus had to 
create an audience. A large section of the philosophical world 
had for long been dissatisfied with the Stoic, no less than with 
the Epicurean, dogmatism. The opposition was partly scep- 
tical, partly Neo-Pythagorean and Platonic. The sceptical 
opposition was represented first by the New Academy, as we 
see in Cicero ; afterwards by the revived P}^rrhonism of Aene- 
sidemus and Sextus. In Cicero we see also, set against both 
Epicureanism and Stoicism as a more positive kind of opposi- 
tion, a sort of eclectic combination of Platonic and Peripatetic 
positions. A later stage of this movement is represented by 
Plutarch; when Platonism, though not yet assuming syste- 
matic form, is already more metaphysical or "theological," 
and less predominantly ethical, than the eclecticism of Cicero's 
time. On its positive side the movement gained strength in 
proportion as the sceptical attack weakened the prevailing 
dogmatic schools. These at the same time ceased to give 
internal satisfaction, as we perceive in the melancholy tone 
of Marcus Aurelius. By the end of the second century, the 
new positive current was by far the strongest ; but no thinker 
1 iii. 2, p. 452. 2 V. Plot 14. 



IV] AND HIS NEAREST PREDECESSORS 33 

of decisive originality had appeared, at least on the line of 
Greek thought. In Plotinus was now to appear the greatest 
individual thinker between Aristotle and Descartes. Under 
the attraction of his systematising intellect, all that remained 
of aspiration after an independent philosophy was rallied to 
a common centre. Essentially, the explanation of the change 
is to be found in his individual power. Yet he had his pre- 
cursors as well as his teachers. There were two thinkers at 
least who, however little they may have influenced him, 
anticipated some of his positions. 

The first was Philo of Alexandria, who was born about 
30 B.C., and died later than a.d. 40. The second was Numenius 
of Apamea, who is said to have flourished between 160 and 
180 a.d. Philo was pretty certainly unknown to Plotinus. 
Numenius was read in his class-room ; but his disciple Amelius 
wrote a treatise, dedicated to Porphyry, in which, replying to 
an accusation of plagiarism, he pointed out the differences be- 
tween their master's teaching and that of Numenius. Amelius, 
it may be remarked, had acquired a great reputation by his 
thorough knowledge of the writings of Numenius. Porphyry 
cites also the testimony of Longinus. The judgment of the 
eminent critic was for the unquestionable originality of Plo- 
tinus among the philosophers of his own and the preceding 
age 1 . In what that originality consisted, Plotinus, who spoke 
of him as "a philologist but by no means a philosopher," 
might not have allowed his competence to decide. He him- 
self confessed that he did not understand some treatises of 
Plotinus that were sent to him. What he ascribes to him in 
the passage quoted by Porphyry is simply a more accurate 
mode of interpreting the Pythagorean and Platonic principles 
than had been attempted by others who took the same general 
direction. This, however, only renders his judgment the more 



1 Longinus ap. Porph. V. Plot. 20: 61 8k...Tp6ircp dewpias I8lip xPVV&ftwo 1 - 
nXumV6s ecVi kclI TevTiXiavbs' AfieXios,. . .ovSe yap ovd' eyyijs n rd ^ov/ultjvIoi /cat 
Kpoviov /ecu MoSepdrou Kai QpaatiWov rois HXutIvov irepi twv avrwv <xvyypdp:p.acnv 
et's aKpi($eiav ' 6 8e 'AyiieXtos /car' lx vr l ^ v tovtov (3a5L£eiv irpoa.Lpovp.evos Kai rd 
7roXXd p.h tQiv avrQiv doy/mdTOJV ixbpt-evos, rrj de e^epyaaia ttoXvs uv...wv /cai fxovicv 
7]p.eis a^iov elvai vofii^ofiev eiricKoirdadai. rd a vyy pd p. p.ar a. 

w. 3 



34 PLOTINUS [CH. 

decisive as to the impression Plotinus made in spite of the 
difficulties of his style. 

To make clear what doctrines of Plotinus were anticipated, 
the principles of his metaphysics must be stated in brief pre- 
liminary outline. Of the causes above the visible world, he 
placed highest of all the One beyond thought and being. To 
the One, in the Neo-Platonic philosophy, the name of God is 
applicable in a peculiar manner. Everything after it that is 
called divine is regarded as derivative. Next in order, as the 
effect of the Cause and Principle, comes the divine Mind, 
identical with the "intelligible world" which is its object. 
Last in the order of supramundane causes comes the Soul of 
the whole, produced by Mind. Thence the descent is to the 
world of particular souls and changing things. The series 
composed of the primal One, the divine Mind, and the Soul 
of the whole, is sometimes called the "Neo-Platonic Trinity 1 ." 
Now Numenius put forth the idea of a Trinity which in one 
point resembles that of Plotinus. 

According to Proclus, Numenius distinguished "three 
Gods." The first he called the Father, the second the Maker 2 , 
while the third was the World, or that which is made 3 . The 
point of resemblance here to Plotinus is the distinction of "the 
first God" from the Platonic Demiurgus, signified by "the 
Maker." With Numenius, however, the first God is Being and 
Mind; not, as with Plotinus, a principle beyond these. Zeller 
remarks that, since a similar distinction of the highest God 
from the Creator of the world appears before Numenius in the 
Christian Gnostics, among whom the Valentinians adopted 

1 It is of course inexact to speak of a first, second and third "Person" in 
the Trinity of Plotinus. Even the generalised term "hypostasis" is more 
strictly applicable in Christian than in Neo-Platonic theology, as Vacherot 
points out. See Hisloire Critique de VEcole d' 'Alexandrie, t. ii. p. 425 n. 

2 Cf . Timaeus, 28 c. 

3 Comm. in Tim. p. 93 a; ed. Diehl, i. 303-4. (R. P. 506 a; Zeller, iii. 2, 
p. 220, n. 6.) irarepa [xkv /caXet top irpurov, iroLrjrriv de top devrepop, iroir]fj.a de 
top tp'ltop ' 6 yap koc/jlos Kar' avrbp 6 Tpiros iarl deos. A protest follows against 
this " hypostasising," as we should call it, of the Father and the Maker. To 
divide apart the one Cause, following the names, says Proclus, is as if, because 
Plato calls the Whole both "heaven" and "world," we were to speak of the 
Heaven and the World as two different things. 



IV] AND HIS NEAREST PREDECESSORS 35 

the name " Demiurgus " from Plato, it was probably from 
them that Numenius got the hint for his theory; and that in 
addition Philo's theory of the Logos doubtless influenced him 1 . 
To this accordingly we must turn as possibly the original 
starting-point for the Neo-Platonic doctrine. 

With Philo, the Logos is the principle that mediates be- 
tween the supreme God and the world formed out of matter. 
Essentially the conception, in so far as it means a rational 
order of production running through nature, is of Greek origin, 
being taken directly from the Stoics, who got at least the 
suggestion of it from Heraclitus 2 . Philo regards the Logos 
as containing the Ideas in accordance with which the visible 
world was formed. By this Platonising turn, it becomes in 
the end a different conception from the divine "Reason" of 
the Stoics, embodied as that is in the material element of 
fire. On the other hand, by placing the Platonic Ideas in the 
divine Mind, Philo interprets Plato in a sense which many 
scholars, both in antiquity and in modern times, have refused 
to allow. Here Plotinus coincides with Philo. Among those 
who dissented from this view was Longinus. Porphyry, who, 
before he came to Rome, had been the pupil of Longinus at 
Athens, was not without difficulty brought over, by con- 
troversy with Amelius, to the view of Plotinus, "that in- 
telligibles do not exist outside intellect 3 ." Thus by Plotinus 
as by Philo the cause and principle of things is distinguished 
from the reason or intellect which is its proximate effect; and, 
in the interpretation of Plato, the divine mind is regarded as 
containing the ideas, whereas in the Timaeus they are figured 
as existing outside the mind of the Demiurgus. On the other 
hand, Plotinus differs both from Philo and from the Gnostics 
in consistently treating as mythical the representation of a 
maker setting out from a certain moment of time to shape 
things according to a pattern out of pre-existent matter. And, 
in spite of his agreement with Philo up to a certain point, 

f g} iii. 2, p. 219, n. 3. 

2 See, for the detailed genealogy of the conception, Principal Drummond's 
Philo Judaeus, vol. i. 

3 V. Plot. 18. The position which he had adopted from Longinus was ore 
££« rod vov v(pe(XT7}Ke ra vorjrd. 

3—2 



36 PLOTINUS [CH. 

there is nothing to show that their views were historically 
connected. Against the attempt to connect Plotinus, or even 
Numenius, with Philo, a strong argument is urged by Dr Bigg. 
Neither Plotinus nor Numenius, as he points out, ever uses 
X070? as a technical term for the "second hypostasis 1 ." Yet, 
if they had derived their theory from Philo, this is evidently 
what they would have done; for the Philonian X070?, on the 
philosophical side, was not alien from Greek thought, but was 
a genuine product of it. In truth, to adapt the conception to 
their own systems by means of a change of name, would have 
been more difficult than to arrive at their actual terminology 
directly by combining Stoical and Aristotelian positions with 
their Platonism. This kind of combination is what we find in 
the eclectic thinkers, of whom Numenius was one. Plotinus 
made use of the same elements; the presence of which in his 
system Porphyry has expressly noted 2 . And, so far as the 
relation of the Neo-Platonic Trinity to Plato is concerned, the 
exact derivation of the three "hypostases" is pointed out in 
a fragment of Porphyry's lost History of Philosophy 3 . The 
highest God, we there learn, is the Idea of the Good in the 
Republic ; the second and third hypostases are the Demiurgus 
and the Soul of the World in the Timaeus. To explain the 
triadic form of such speculations, no theory of individual 

1 See Neoplatonism, pp. 123, 242, etc. Dr Bigg's actual assertions are too 
sweeping. It is not quite correct to say, as he does in the second of the pass- 
ages referred to, that Plotinus expressly refuses to apply to his principle of 
Intelligence the title Logos, which in his system means, as with the Stoics, 
" little more than physical force." There are indeed passages where he refuses 
to apply the title in some special reference; but elsewhere — as in Enn. v. 1, 6 
— he says that Soul is the *koyos of Mind, and Mind the \6yos of the One. 
While the term with him has many applications, and among them the 
Stoical application to the "seminal reasons" (or formulae) of natural things, 
it may most frequently be rendered by "rational law." 

This indeed might well be adopted as the usual rendering of the term from 
Heraclitus onward whenever it seems to approximate to an ontological sense. 
Psychologically of course it often means simply "reason," though this is 
never its exact sense in Heraclitus, with whom the transition of the idea is 
from "word" or "discourse" to "law" or "measure." 

2 V. Plot. 14: ififiefiLKTat 8' iv tols (Tvyypa.p.p.aai nal to, Stoh/co. Xavdavovra 
d6yfj,ara /ecu ra He piir arr)T oca ' KaraireTrvKvuTai 8e teal ij fxera ra <pv<riKa tou 
'ApiaToreXovs irpayfiareia. 

3 Fragm. 16 in Nauck's Opuscula Selecta. 



IV] AND HIS NEAREST PREDECESSORS 37 

borrowing on any side is necessary. All the thinkers of the 
period, whether Hellenic, Jewish or Christian, had grown up 
in an atmosphere of Neo-Pythagorean speculation about num- 
bers, for which the triad was of peculiar significance 1 . Thus 
on the whole it seems that Numenius and Plotinus drew 
independently from sources common to them with Philo, but 
cannot well have been influenced by him. 

Plotinus, as we have seen, had some knowledge of Numenius ; 
but, where a special point of contact has been sought, the 
difference is as obvious as the resemblance. The great differ- 
ence, however, is not in any detail of the triadic theory. It is 
that Plotinus was able to bring all the elements of his system 
under the direction of an organising thought. That thought 
was a definitely conceived immaterialist monism which, so far 
as we know, neither Philo nor Numenius had done anything 
substantially to anticipate. He succeeded in clearly develop- 
ing out of Plato the conception of incorporeal essence, which 
his precursors had rather tended by their eclecticism to con- 
fuse. That the conception was in Plato, the Neo-Platonists 
not only admitted but strongly maintained. Yet Plato's meta- 
phorical expressions had misled even Aristotle, who seriously 
thought that he found presupposed in them a spatial extensio n 
of the soul 2 . And if Aristotle had got rid of semi-materialistic 
"animism" even in expression, this had not prevented his 
successors from running into a new materialism of their own. 
Much as the Platonising schools had all along protested 
against the tendency to make the soul a kind of body or an 
outcome of body, they had not hitherto overcome it by clear 
definitions and distinctions. This is one thing that Plotinus 
and his successors achieved in their effort after an idealist 
metaphysic. 

It was on this side especially that the thought of the school 
influenced the Fathers and Doctors of the Church. On the 

1 Jules Simon, in his Histoire de VlUcole d'Alexandrie, dwells on this point 
as an argument against the view, either that Neo-Platonism borrowed its 
Trinity from Christianity or Christianity from Neo-Platonism. 

2 Proclus wrote a book to show that Plato's view of the soul is not open 
to the objections raised by Aristotle. See Comm. in Tim. 226 d; ed. Diehl, 
ii. 279. 



38 PLOTINUS [CH. 

specific dogmas of Christian theology, Neo-Platonism prob- 
ably exercised little influence. From Platonising Judaism or 
Christianity, it received none at all. At most an isolated ex- 
pression occurs showing that the antipathy to alien religions 
was not so unqualified as to prevent appreciation, for example, 
of the Platonism in the Fourth Gospel. Numenius, it is in- 
teresting to note, was one of the few earlier writers who attach 
themselves to the Hellenic tradition and yet show traces of 
sympathetic contact with Hebraic religion. He is said to have 
called Plato "a Moses writing Attic 1 ." On the other side Philo, 
though by faith a Jew, w r as as a philosopher essentially Greek 
both in thought and in terminology. What divided him from 
the Hellenic thinkers was simply his acceptance of formal 
limitations on thought prescribed by a positive religion. 

In concluding the present chapter, a word may be said on 
the literary style of Plotinus, and on the temper of himself and 
his school in relation to life. His writing is admittedly diffi- 
cult ; yet it is not wanting in beautiful passages that leave an 
impression even of facility. He is in general, as Porphyry says, 
concentrated, "abounding more in thoughts than in words." 
The clearness of his systematic thought has been recognised by 
expositors in spite of obscurities in detail ; and the obscurities 
often disappear with close study. On the thought when it 
comes in contact with life is impressed the character of ethical 
purity and inwardness which always continued to mark the 
school. At the same time, there is a return to the Hellenic 
love of beauty and knowledge for themselves. Stoical elements 
are incorporated, but the exaggerated "tension" of Stoicism 
has disappeared. While the Neo-Platonists are more con- 
sistently ascetic than the Stoics, there is nothing harsh or 
repulsive in their asceticism. The ascetic life was for them 
not a mode of self-torture, but the means to a happiness 
which on the whole they succeeded in attaining. Perhaps the 
explanation is that they had restored the idea of theoretic 

1 Suid. and Clem. Strom. (R. P. 7 b, 504.) H yap £<tti TTKaruv tj Muva-rjs 
clttlki^oiv ; (M. Theodore Reinach, in Textes d 'auteurs grecs et romains relatifs 
au Judaisme, p. 175, n. 2, disputes the genuineness of this often-quoted 
fragment). 



IV] AND HIS NEAREST PREDECESSORS 39 

virtue, against the too narrowly practical tone of the pre- 
ceding schools. Hence abstinence from the ordinary objects 
of pursuit left no blank. It was not felt as a deprivation, but 
as a source of power to think and feel. And in thinking they 
knew that indirectly they were acting. For theory, with 
them, is the remoter source of all practice, which bears to it 
the relation of the outward effect to the inward cause. 



CHAPTEE V 

THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM OF PLOTINUS 

As idealists and their opponents alike recognise, one great 
stumbling-block of an idealist philosophy is language. This 
was seen by Plato, by Plotinus, and by Berkeley, just as from 
the other side it is seen by the materialist and the dualist. 
Language was formed primarily to indicate the things of sense, 
and these have not the characters which idealism, whether 
ancient or modern, ascribes to reality. Ancient idealism re- 
fuses to call external things real in the full sense, because they 
are in flux. The reality is the fixed mental concept or its un- 
changing intelligible object. Modern idealism regards things 
as merely "phenomenal," because they appear to a conscious- 
ness, and beyond this appearance have no definable reality. 
Whether reality itself is fixed or changing, may by the modern 
idealist be left undetermined; but at any rate the groups of 
perceptions that make up the "objects" of daily experience 
and even of science are not, in his view, objects existing in 
themselves apart from mind, and known truly as such. Only 
by some relation to mind can reality be constituted. The way 
in which language opposes itself to ancient idealism is by its 
implication that existence really changes. To modern idealism 
it opposes itself by its tendency to treat external things as 
absolute objects with a real existence apart from that of all 
thinking subjects. 

The two forms of developed idealism here regarded as 
typically ancient and modern are the earliest and the latest — 
that of Plato on the one side, that of post-Cartesian, and still 
more of post-Kantian, thinkers on the other. The idealism of 
Plotinus contains elements that bring it into relation with 
both. English readers know how Berkeley insists that, if we 
are to grasp his doctrine, we must attend to the meanings he 
desires to convey, and must not dwell on the mere form of 






CH. V] THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM OF PLOTINUS 41 

expression. Let us see how Plato and Plotinus deal with the 
same difficulty. 

Plato's treatment of it may be most readily studied in the 
Cratylus. Language, Socrates undertakes to show, has a cer- 
tain natural conformity to things named. To those who named 
them, external things mostly presented themselves as in flux. 
Accordingly, words are full of devices by the makers of lan- 
guage for expressing gliding and flowing movements. With 
a little ingenuity and an occasional evasion, those who hold 
that the true nature of everything is to flow and not to be in 
any manner fixed, might exhibit the early legislators over 
human speech as in exact agreement with their philosophical 
opinions. Yet after all there are some words, though fewer, 
that appear at first sight to express stability. So that the 
primitive legislators were not, on the face of things, perfectly 
consistent. On the whole, however, words suggesting flux 
predominate. Similarly the early myth-makers, in their deri- 
vation of all things from Ocean and Tethys, seem to have 
noticed especially the fact of change in the world. The 
Heracliteans, therefore, have the advantage in the appeal to 
language and mythology. Still, their Eleatic opponents may 
be right philosophically. The makers of language and myth 
may have framed words and imagined the origin of things in 
accordance with what is apparent but not real. Real existence 
in itself may be stable. If this is so, then, to express philo- 
sophic thought accurately, it will be necessary to reform 
language. In the meantime, the proper method in all our 
inquiries and reasonings must be, to attend to things rather 
than words. 

According to the Platonic doctrine, the "place of ideas" is 
the soul 1 . In virtue of its peculiar relations to those stable 
and permanent existences known by intellect, the individual 
soul is itself permanent. It gives unity, motion and life to the 
fluent aggregate of material particles forming its temporary 
body. It disappears from one body and reappears in another, 
existing apart in the intervals between its mortal lives. Thus 
by Plato the opposition of soul and body is brought, as a 
1 Arist. De An. iii. 4, 429 a 27. (R. P. 251 c.) 



42 THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM [CH. 

subordinate relation, under the more general opposition of the 
stable ideas — the existence of which is not purely and simply 
in the soul, but is also in some way transcendent — and the flux 
of material existence. For Plotinus. this subordinate opposi- 
tion has become the starting-point. He does not dismiss the 
earlier antithesis ; but the main problem with him is not to find 
permanence somewhere as against absolute flux. He allows in 
the things of sense also a kind of permanence. His aim is first 
of all to prove that the soul has a real existence of its own, 
distinguished from body and corporeal modes of being. For 
in the meantime body as such — and no longer, as with the 
Heracliteans, a process of the whole — had been set up by the 
dominant schools as the absolute reality. By the Epicureans 
and Stoics, everything that can be spoken of at all was re- 
garded as body, or a quality or relation of body, or else as 
having no being other than "nominal." The main point of 
attack for scepticism had been the position common to the 
naturalistic schools, that external things can be known by 
direct apprehension as they really are. Neither the Aca- 
demical nor the Pyrrhonist scepticism, however, had taken 
the place of the ruling dogmatic system, which was that of 
the Stoics. Thus the doctrine that Plotinus had to meet was 
still essentially materialism, made by the sceptical attack less 
sure of itself, but not dethroned. 

The method he adopts is to insist precisely on the para- 
doxical character of the soul's existence as contrasted with 
that of corporeal things. How specious is the view of his 
opponents he allows. Body can be seen and touched. It re- 
sists pressure and is spread out in space. Soul is invisible and 
intangible, and by its very definition unextended. Thus lan- 
guage has to be struggled with in the attempt to describe it ; 
and in the end can only be made to express the nature of soul 
by constraining it to purposes for which most men never 
think of employing it. What is conclusive, however, as against 
the materialistic view, is that the soul cannot be described at 
all except by phrases which would be nonsensical if applied 
to body or its qualities, or to determinations of particular 
bodies. Once the conception of soul has been fixed as that 



V] OF PLOTINUS 43 

of an incorporeal reality, body is seen to admit of a kind of 
explanation in terms of soul — from which it derives its " form " 
— whereas the essential nature of soul admitted of no expla- 
nation in terms of body. 

Above soul and beneath body, as we shall see, Plotinus has 
other principles, derived from earlier metaphysics, by which 
he is able to construct a complete philosophy, and not merely 
what would be called in modern phrase a "rational psy- 
chology." His psychology, however, is the centre. Within 
the soul, he finds all the metaphysical principles in some way 
represented. In it are included the principles of unity, of pure 
intellect, of moving and vitalising power, and, in some sense, 
of matter itself. Further, by what may be called his "em- 
pirical psychology," he prepared the starting-point for the 
distinctively modern "theory of knowledge." This he did, as 
Prof. Siebeck has shown 1 , by the new precision he gave to the 
conception of consciousness. On this side he reaches forward 
to Descartes, as on the other side he looks back to Plato and 
Aristotle. 

1. Psychology. 

It is absurd, or rather impossible, says Plotinus at the open- 
ing of one of his earliest expositions 2 , that life should be the 
product of an aggregation of bodies, or that things without 
understanding should generate mind. If, as some say, the 
soul is a permeating air with a certain habitude (irvevfia 7ro)5 
e'xpv) — and it cannot be air simply, for there are innumer- 
able airs without life — then the habitude (ttcd<; fyov or cr^eo^?) 
is either a mere name, and there is really nothing but the 
" breath," or it is a kind of being (twv ovtwv tl). In the latter 
case, it is a rational principle and of another nature than body 
(X0709 av €lt) res /cal ov crwfia teal <£ucrt? erepa). If the soul 
were matter, it could produce only the effects of the particular 
kind of matter that it is — giving things its own quality, hot 
or cold, and so forth — not all the opposite effects actually 
produced in the organism. The soul is not susceptible of 
quantitative increase or diminution, or of division. Thus it 

1 Geschichte der Psychologie, i. 2. 2 Enn. iv. 7. 



44 THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM [CH. 

has not the characters of a thing possessing quantity (airoo-ov 
apa tj tyvxn)- The unity in perception would be impossible if 
that which perceives consisted of parts spatially separated. 
It is impossible that the mental perception, for example, of 
a pain in the finger, should be transmitted from the " animal 
spirit" (■^rv^LKov irvevfia) of the finger to the ruling part (to 
r/yefiovovv) in the organism. For, in that case, there must 
either be accumulated an infinity of perceptions, or each 
intermediate part in succession must feel the pain only in 
itself, and not in the parts previously affected; and so also 
the ruling part when it becomes affected in its turn. That 
there can be no such physical transmission as is supposed of 
a mental perception, results from the very nature of material 
mass, which consists of parts each standing by itself: one 
part can have no knowledge of what is suffered by another 
part. Consequently we must assume a percipient which is 
everywhere identical with itself. Such a percipient must be 
another kind of being than body. That which thinks can 
still less be body than that which perceives. For even if it is 
not allowed that thought is the laying hold on intelligibles 
without the use of any bodily organ, yet there are certainly 
involved in it apprehensions of things without magnitude 
(dfjueyiOeov dvTiXtfylreis). Such are abstract conceptions, as for 
example those of the beautiful and the just. How then can 
that which is a magnitude think that which is not? Must we 
suppose it to think the indivisible with that in itself which is 
divisible? If it can think it at all, it must rather be with some 
indivisible part of itself. That which thinks, then, cannot be 
body. For the supposed thinking body has no function as an 
extended whole (and to be such is its nature as body), since 
it cannot as a whole come in contact with an object that is 
incorporeal. 

The soul in relation to the body, according to Plotinus's 
own mode of statement, is "all in all and all in every part 1 ." 
Thus it is in a sense divisible because it is in all the parts of 
a divisible body. Properly it is indivisible because it is all in 
the whole and all in each part of it. Its unity is unlike that 
1 Enn. rv. 2, 1. 



V] OF PLOTINUS 45 

of a body, which is one by spatial continuity, having different 
parts each of which is in a different place ; and unlike that of 
a quality of body such as colour, which can be wholly in many 
discontinuous bodies. In the case of a quality, that which is 
the same in all portions of body that possess it in common is 
an affection {ird67]yua)^ and not an essence (ova La). Its identity 
is formal, and not numerical, as is the case with the soul 1 . 

In this general argumentation, it will be observed, Plotinus 
starts from the supposition that the body has a reality other 
than phenomenal. Allowing this, he is able to demonstrate 
against his opponents that a reality of a different kind from 
that of body must also be assumed. In his metaphysics he 
goes further, and reduces corporeal things in effect to pheno- 
mena; but in his psychology he continues to take a view 
nearer that of "common-sense." Thus he is confronted with 
the difficulties that have since become familiar about the 
"connexion of body and mind," and the possibility of their 
interaction. He lays bare in a single saying the root of all 
such difficulties. How if, in talking of a "mixture" of a 
corporeal with an incorporeal nature, we should be trying to 
realise an impossibility, as if one should say that linear mag- 
nitude is mixed with whiteness 2 ? The solution for psychology 
is found in the theory that the soul itself remains "unmixed" 
in spite of its union with body; but that it causes the pro- 
duction of a "common" or "dual" or "composite" nature, 
which is the subject in perception. By the aid of this inter- 
mediary, the unity of the soul is reconciled — though not with- 
out perplexities in detail — with localisation of the organic 
functions that subserve its activity. 

The different parts of the animated body participate in the 

1 Cf. Enn. vi. 4, 1. The peculiar relation of the soul, in itself indivisible, to 
the body, in itself divisible, and so communicating a kind of divisibility to the 
soul, Plotinus finds indicated by the "divine enigma" of the "mixture" in the 
Timaeus. Enn. rv. 2, 2: tovto dpa iarl to deius rjviyixevov ' rrjs d/xepicrTOv /cat 
dei Kara tcl atird exotfcr^s [ovcrlas] ical ttjs vepl ret aui/xara yiyvofxivTjs fiepKTTrjs 
rpirov 4£ dfi(f>oiv avveKepdaaro ovaias eldos.' 

2 Enn. I. 1, 4: ^"f\rr\Tiov 5e nai rbv rpbirov rrjs «i'£eu>j, fi7)7T0T€ ov Swards rj, 
uxrirep dv el' tis Xeyoi fiefuxdcu Xeu/cy ypa/j.fji,rjv, <t>ti<yt.v aX\r]v aXX??. This book, 
though coming first in Porphyry's arrangement according to subjects, is given 
as the last but one in the chronological order. 



46 THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM [ch. 

soul's powers in different ways 1 . According as each organ of 
sense is fitted for one special function, a particular power of 
perception may be said to be there ; the power of sight in the 
eyes, of hearing in the ears, of smell in the nostrils, of taste in 
the tongue, of touch everywhere. Since the primary organs of 
touch are the nerves, which have also the power of animal 
motion, and since the nerves take their origin from the brain, 
in the brain may be placed the starting-point of the actual 
exercise of all powers of perception and movement. Above 
perception is reason. This power has not properly a physical 
organ at all, and so is not really in the head; but it was 
assigned to the head by the older writers because it com- 
municates directly with the psychical functions of which the 
brain is the central organ. For these last, as Plotinus remarks, 
have a certain community with reason. In perception there is 
a kind of judgment ; and on reason together with the imagina- 
tion derived from perception, impulse follows. 

In making the brain central among the organs that are 
in special relation with mind, Plotinus of course adopts the 
Platonic as against the Aristotelian position, which made the 
heart central. At the same time, he incorporates what had 
since been discovered about the special functions of the ner- 
vous system, which were unknown to Aristotle as to Plato. 
The vegetative power of the soul he places in relation with 
the liver, because here is the origin of the veins and the blood 
in the veins, by means of which that power causes the nourish- 
ment of the body. Hence, as with Plato, appetite is assigned 
to this region. Spirited emotion, in accordance with the 
Platonic psychology, has its seat in the breast, where is the 
spring of lighter and purer blood. 

Both perceptions and memories are "energies" or activities, 
not mere passive impressions received and stored up in the 
soul 2 . Take first the case of the most distinct perception. In 
sight, when we wish to perceive anything clearly, we direct 
our vision in a straight line to the object. This outwardly 
directed activity would not be necessary if the object simply 
left its impression on the soul. Were this the whole process, 
1 Enn. rv. 3, 23. 2 Enn. iv. 6. 



v] OF PLOTINUS 47 

we should see not the outward objects of vision, but images 
and shadows of them; so that what we see would be other 
than the things themselves (ware aXka fjuev elvac avrd ra 
7rpdy/iara, a\\a Be rd rjfjuv opoofjueva). In hearing as in sight, 
perceptions are energies, not impressions nor yet passive 
states (firj tvttol, /jL7)§€ TrelaeL^). The impression is an articu- 
lated stroke in the air, on which it is as if letters were written 
by that which makes the sound. The power of the soul as it 
were reads those impressions. In the case of taste and smell, 
the passive affections (irdOr]) are one thing; the perceptions 
and judgments of them are another. Memory of things is pro- 
duced by exercise of the soul, either generally or in relation 
to a special class of them. Children remember better because 
they have fewer things to attend to. Mere multitude of 
impressions retained, if memory were simply an affair of 
retaining impressions, would not cause them to be less re- 
membered. Nor should we need to consider in order to re- 
mind ourselves ; nor forget things and afterwards recall them 
to mind. The persistence of passive impressions in the soul, 
if real, would be a mark rather of weakness than of strength, 
for that which is most fixedly impressed is so by giving way 
(to yap evrv7T(6raTov rw et/ceiv earl tolovtov). But where 
there is really weakness, as in the old, both memory and per- 
ception are worse. 

The activity of perception, though itself mental, has direct 
physical conditions. That of memory has not. Memory itself 
belongs wholly to the soul, though it may take its start from 
what goes on in the composite being. What the soul directly 
preserves the memory of, is its own movements, not those of 
body. Pressure and reaction of bodies can furnish no explana- 
tion of a storing-up of mental "impressions" (tvttol), which 
are not magnitudes. That the body, through being in flux, is 
really a hindrance to memory, is illustrated by the fact that 
often additions to the store cause forgetfulness, whereas 
memory emerges when there is abstraction and purification 1 . 
Something from the past that was retained but is latent may 

1 Enn. IV. 3, 26: irpocmdefjievuv tlpuv Xrjdrj, ev 5' acpaipeaei Kal Kaddpaec 
dvaKvirrei -ttoW&kis r/ ixvrjfir]. 



48 THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM [CH. 

be recalled when other memories or the impressions of the 
moment are removed. Yet, though it is not the composite 
being but the soul itself that possesses memory, memories 
come to it not only from its spontaneous activity, but from 
its activity incited by that which takes place in consequence 
of its association with the body 1 . There are memories of what 
has been done and suffered by the dual nature, though the 
memories themselves, as distinguished from that which in- 
cites them, are purely mental. Thus indirectly the physical 
organism has a bearing on memory as well as on perception. 
It follows, however, from the general view, that memory as 
well as reason belongs to the "separable" portion of the soul. 
Whether those who have attained to the perfection of virtue 
will, in the life of complete separation from the body, retain 
indefinitely their memories of the past, is another question. 
The discussion of it belongs rather to the ethics than to the 
pure psychology of Plotinus. 

To specific questions about sense-perception, Plotinus de- 
votes two short books, both of which are concerned primarily 
with vision. Discussing the transmission of light 2 , he finds 
that, like all perception, seeing must take place through some 
kind of body. The affection of the medium, however, need not 
be identical with that of the sense-organ. A reed, for example, 
through which is transmitted the shock of a torpedo, is not 
affected like the hand that receives the shock. The air, he 
concludes, is no instrument in vision. If it were, we should be 
able to see without looking at the distant object; just as we 
are warmed by the heated air we are in contact with. In the 
case of heat too, Plotinus adds, we are warmed at the same 
time with the air, rather than by means of it. Solid bodies 
receive more of the heat than does the air intervening between 
them and the heated object. In pursuance of this argument, 
he remarks that even the transmission of sound is not wholly 
dependent on a stroke in an aerial medium. Tones vary ac- 
cording to the differences of the bodies from which the sound 
starts, and not simply according to the shock. Furthermore, 
sounds are transmitted within our bodies without the inter- 
1 Enn. iv. 3, 27. 2 Enn. rv. 5. 



v] OF PLOTINUS 49 

mediation of air; as when bones are bent or sawn 1 . The shock 
itself, whether in air or not, when it arrives at perception is 
the sound. Light Plotinus defines as an incorporeal energy 
of the luminous body directed outwards. Being an " energy," 
and not a mere quality (irotorr}^), it is capable of overleaping 
an interval without becoming inherent in that which occupies 
the interval ; as, in fact, it leaves no impress on the air through 
which it passes. It can exist in the interspace without a per- 
cipient, though a percipient, if present, would be affected by it. 
For positive explanation here, Plotinus falls back on the 
idea, borrowed from the Stoics, of a "sympathy" binding to- 
gether remote but like parts of the universe. The other book 
mentioned 2 , which discusses the question why things seen at a 
distance appear small, is interesting from its points of contact 
with Berkeley. To solve the problem, Plotinus sets out in 
quest of something more directly psychological than the 
"visual angle 3 ." Is not one reason for differences of estimate, 
he asks, because our view of magnitude is in an "accidental" 
relation to colour, which is what we primarily behold 4 ? To 
perceive how large any magnitude really is, we must be near 
it, so as to be able to go over its parts in succession. At a 
distance, the parts of the object do not permit accurate dis- 
cernment of their relative colouring, since the colours arrive 
faint (d/jbvSpa). Faintness in colours corresponds to smallness 
in magnitude; both have in common "the less" (to rjrrov). 
Thus the magnitude, following the colour, is diminished pro- 
portionally (dvd\6yov). The nature of the affection, however, 
becomes plainer in things of varied colours. Confusion of 
colours, whether in near or distant objects, causes apparent 
diminution of size, because the parts do not offer differences by 
which they can be accurately distinguished and so measured 5 . 
Magnitudes also of the same kind and of like colours are 

1 Enn. iv. 5, 5: ovk kv aepi, dXXd ffvyKpovaavros ical irX-q^avTos aWo dMoir 
otov /cat octtQv Kdfi\peiS irpbs dAX^Xa irapaTpifionevuv aepos jxt) cWos /xera^v /cai 
irpiaeLS. 

2 Enn. ii. 8. 3 Cf. Theory of Vision, § 79. 

4 Enn. II. 8, 1 : on Kara av/m^€^VKbs oparat to /xeyedos rod xpcoyuaros irpwTws 
deupov/xevov. 

5 Cf. Theory of Vision, § 56. 

w. 4 



50 THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM [CH. 

deceptive because the sight slips away; having, for precisely 
the same reason as in the case of confused colours, no hold on 
the parts. Again, distant objects look near at hand because 
there is loss of visible detail in the intervening scenery. Close 
as all this comes to Berkeley, at least in psychological method, 
the incidental remark comes still closer, that that to which we 
primarily refer visible magnitude appears to be touch. This 
occurs in a question about the "magnitude" of sound, to 
which reference is made by way of illustrating the analogy 
of great and small in different sense-perceptions 1 . 

Feeling, in the sense of pleasure and pain, according to 
Plotinus, belongs primarily to the animated body, in the 
parts of which it is localised 2 . The perception of it, but not 
the feeling itself, belongs to the soul. Sometimes, however, in 
speaking of the feeling of pleasure or pain, we include along 
with it the accompanying perception. Corporal desires too 
have their origin from the common nature of the animated 
body. That this is their source is shown by the differences, in 
respect of desires, between different times of life, and between 
persons in health and disease. In his account of desire and 
aversion, Plotinus notes the coincidence between mental and 
bodily movements 3 . The difference between the affection of 
the animated body on the one side and the soul's clear per- 
ception of it on the other, applies both to appetitive and to 
irascible emotion 4 . Of these the second is not derived from 
the first, but both spring from a common root. That its origin 
cannot be entirely independent is shown by the fact that those 
who are less eager after bodily pleasures are less prone to anger 
and irrational passions. To explain the impulse (op/nrj) to repel 
actively the cause of injury, we must suppose perception added 
to the mere resentment (ayavd/crTjais), which, as a passion, is 
primarily a boiling-up of the blood. The "trace of soul" on 

1 Enn. H. 8, 1 : t'ivl yap irpwTWS to iv rrj cpowfi p.eyedos, ucnrep doKet rrj a<f>fj to 
bpdifxevov; 

2 Enn. iv. 4, 18-21. 

3 Enn. rv. 4, 20: e/c rrjs oSuvrjs eyivero 17 yvwo-is, /cat airayeiv e/c rod ttolovvtos 
to irddos t\ •'//vxv ftovXofjieur) eVot'et tt\v (pvyqv, /cat rov wpLorov iradovros SlMgkovtos 
tovto (pevyovrbs ttuis /cat avrov 4v rrj avaroXrj. 

4 Enn. iv. 4, 28. 



V] OF PLOTINUS 51 

which this kind of emotion depends (to eKireaov et? Ovfiov 
lx v °s) nas its seat in the heart. 

Error too arises from the common nature, by which right 
reason becomes weak, as the wisest counsellor in an assembly 
may be overborne by the general clamour 1 . The rational 
power, with Plotinus as with Aristotle, is in its own nature 
"unmixed"; but it has to manifest itself under conditions 
of time and in relation to the composite being. Further dis- 
cussion of these points will in the main come better under the 
head of metaphysics than of psychology. A distinctively 
psychological theory, however, is the explicit transformation 
of the Platonic "reminiscence" into a doctrine of "innate 
ideas" potentially present. The term "memory," Plotinus 
observes, is improperly applied to the intellectual energising 
of the soul in accordance with its innate principles 2 . The 
reason why the older writers ascribed memory and reminis- 
cence to the soul when it thus energises, was apparently be- 
cause it is then energising in accordance with powers it always 
had (as it has now latent memories) but does not always bring 
into action, and especially cannot bring into action on its first 
arrival in the world. In this place for one Plotinus does not 
in the least fail to recognise that there has been scientific pro- 
gress since the time of those whom he calls "the ancients." 

The higher and the lower powers of the soul meet in the 
imaginative faculty ((fravraala, to (fravrao-TCfcov), which is the 
psychical organ of memory and self-consciousness. By this 
view the dispersion is avoided that would result from assigning 
memory of desires to the desiring part of the soul, memories 
of perception to the perceiving part, and memories of thought 
to the thinking part. Thought is apprehended by the imagi- 
nation as in a mirror; the notion (vorj/jia) at first indivisible 
and implicit being conveyed to it by an explicit discourse 
(X070?). For thought and the apprehension of thought are not 
the same (aXXo yap rj v6r)ai<;, zeal aWo r\ 777? vorjaecos avri- 
X^ls) ; the former can exist without the latter. That which 
thus apprehends thought apprehends perceptions also 3 . 

1 Enn. iv. 4, 17. 2 Enn. iv. 3, 25. 

3 Enn. iv. 3, 28-30. 

4—2 



52 THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM [CH. 

Here we come to the psychological conception of " conscious- 
ness," which Prof. Siebeck has traced through its formative 
stages to its practically adequate expression by Plotinus 1 . By 
Plato and Aristotle, as he points out, such expressions are used 
as the "seeing of sight," and, at a higher degree of generality, 
the "perceiving of perception" and the "thinking of thought" ; 
but they have no perfectly general term for the consciousness 
with which we follow any mental process whatever, as distin- 
guished from the process itself. Approximations to such terms 
were made in the post- Aristotelian period by the Stoics and 
others, but it was Plotinus who first gained complete mastery 
of the idea. Sometimes he speaks of "common perception" 
((TvvaLo-Orjcris) in a generalised sense. His most usual expres- 
sion is that of an "accompaniment" (7rapaK6Xov07)a-L<i) of its 
own mental activities by the soul. " Self-consciousness," in its 
distinctive meaning, is expressed by "accompanying oneself" 
{irapaicoXovdelv eavrw). With these terms are joined expres- 
sions for mental "synthesis" (crvvOeais and avveai^) as a 
unitary activity of the soul in reference to its contents. 

Important as the conception of consciousness became for 
modern thought, it is not for Plotinus the highest. Prof. 
Siebeck himself draws attention to one remarkable passage 2 
in which he points out that many of our best activities, both 
theoretical and practical, are unaccompanied at the time by 
consciousness of them; as for example reading, especially 
when we are reading intently; similarly, the performance of 
brave actions; so that there is a danger lest consciousness 
should make the activities it accompanies feebler (axrre ra$ 
TrapafcoXovdrjcreL^ KivZvveveiv a/jLvSporepas avra<; ra? ivepyeia? 
at? TrapafcokovOovGL irouelv). The rank assigned to intro- 
spective consciousness of mental activities is similar to that 
which is assigned to memory 3 . It is above sense, but lower 
than pure intellect, which energises with more perfection in 
its absence. The organ of introspection and of memory, as 
we have seen, is the same. 

The highest mode of subjective life, next to the complete 

1 Geschichte der Psychologie, i. 2, pp. 331 £f. 

2 Enn. i. 4, 10. 3 Enn. iv. 4, 2. 



V] OF PLOTINUS 53 

unification in which even thought disappears, is intellectual 
self-knowledge. Here the knower is identical with the known. 
On this too Plotinus is not without keen psychological obser- 
vations, apart from the metaphysical developments next to be 
considered. The strong impression of a sense-perception, he 
remarks, cannot consist with the attainment of this intellec- 
tual unity. Whatever exaggerates feeling lowers the activity 
of thought. The perception of evils, for example, carries with 
it a more vehement shock, but less clear knowledge. We are 
more ourselves in health than in disease, but disease makes 
itself more felt, as being other than ourselves. The attitude 
of self-knowledge, Plotinus adds, is quite unlike that in which 
we know an object by external perception. Even the knower 
cannot place himself outside like a perceived object and gaze 
upon himself with the eyes of the body 1 . 

Within the mind as its very centre is the supreme unity 
beyond even self-knowledge. This is one with the meta- 
physical cause of all things, and must first be discussed as 
such, since the proof of its reality is primarily metaphysical. 
Its psychological relations will best be dealt with in the 
chapter on the mysticism of Plotinus. 

2. Metaphysics. 

Apart from a unifying principle, nothing could exist. All 
would be formless and indeterminate, and so would have 
properly no being. A principle of unity has already been 
recognised in the soul. It is not absent in natural things, but 
here it is at a lower stage; body having less unity than soul 
because its parts are locally separate. In soul, however, we 
cannot rest as the highest term. Particular souls, by reason of 
what they have in common, can only be understood as derived 
from a general soul, which is their cause but is not identical 
with all or any of them. Again, the general soul falls short of 
complete unity by being the principle of life and motion to 
the world, which is other than itself. What it points to as a 
higher unifying principle is absolutely stable intellect, think- 

1 Enn. v. 8, 11: ov8e yap ovd' avrbs 8vi>a~ai e%o) dels eavrbv ws ai<rdr}Toi> ovra 
6(pda\/u.o?s rots rod au/j-aros (3\eireiv. 



54 THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM [ch. 

mg itself and not the world, but containing as identical with 
its own nature the eternal ideas of all the forms, general and 
particular, that become explicit in the things of time and 
space. Even intellect has still a certain duality, because, 
though intelligence and the intelligible are the same, that 
which thinks distinguishes itself from the object of thought. 
Beyond thought and the being which, while identical with 
it, is distinguishable in apprehension, is the absolute unity 
that is simply identical with itself. This is other than all 
being and is the cause of it. It is the good to which all things 
aspire ; for to particular things the greatest unification attain- 
able is the greatest good ; and neither the goodness and unity 
they possess, nor their aspiration after a higher degree of it, 
can be explained without positing the absolute One and the 
absolute Good as their source and end. 

By the path of which this is a slight indication, Plotinus 
ascends to the summit of his metaphysics. The proof that the 
first principle has really been attained, must be sought partly 
in the demonstration of the process by which the whole system 
of things is derived from it, partly in individual experience. 
This last, being incommunicable — though not to be had with- 
out due preparation — belongs to the mystical side of the 
doctrine. Of the philosophical doctrine itself, the method is 
not mystical. The theory of "emanation" on which it de- 
pends is in reality no more than a very systematic expression 
of the principle common to Plato and Aristotle, that the lower 
is to be explained by the higher 1 . 

The accepted term, "emanation," is derived from one of the 
metaphors by which Plotinus illustrates the production of each 
order of being from the next above. He compares the cause 
of all to an overflowing spring which by its excess gives rise to 
that which comes after it 2 . This similarly produces the next, 
and so forth, till at length in matter pure indetermination is 
reached. The metaphorical character of this representation, 

1 See for example Enn. v. 9, 4 : ov yap 5tj, ws oiovtoll, tyvxh vovv Teheiudeiaa 
yevvq.' irbdev yap to dvvdfxei hepyeia garai, /at] tov els evepyeiav ayovros alrlov 
6Vros;...5i6 Set ra irpQiTa ivepyela ridecrdai /ecu airpoabea nal reXeta. 

2 Enn. v. 2, 1. 



v] OF PLOTINUS 55 

however, is carefully insisted on. There is no diremption of 
the higher principle. God and mind do not disperse themselves 
in individual souls and in natural things, though these are 
nowhere cut off from their causes. There is a continual process 
from first to last, of which the law is the same throughout. 
Each producing cause remains wholly in its proper seat (iv rfj 
ol/cela eBpa), while that which is produced takes an inferior 
station 1 . The One produces universal Mind, or Intellect that 
is one with the Intelligible. Intellect produces the Soul of the 
Whole. This produces all other existences, but without itself 
lapsing. Nothing within the series of the three intelligible 
principles can be said to lapse in production; the term being 
applicable only to the descent of the individual soul. The 
order throughout, both for the intelligible causes and for the 
visible universe, is a logical order of causation, not an order 
in time. All the producing causes and their effects in every 
grade always existed and always will exist. The production 
by the higher causes has the undeviating character of natural 
necessity, and is not by voluntary choice and discursive reason, 
which are secondary resultants within the world of particulars. 

This philosophical meaning Plotinus makes clear again and 
again. His metaphors are intended simply as more or less in- 
adequate illustrations. One that comes nearer to his thought 
than that of the overflowing spring, is the metaphor of illumin- 
ation by a central source of light; for according to his own 
theory light is an incorporeal energy projected without loss. 
Since, however, it is still an energy set going from a body, he 
admits that even this comparison has some inexactitude. In 
this mode of expression, Mind is the eternal "irradiation" of 
the One 2 . As Mind looks back to the One, Soul looks back to 
Mind; and this looking back is identical with the process of 
generation. 

Plotinus himself traces the idea of this causal series to Plato, 
for whom, he says, the Demiurgus is Intellect, which is pro- 
duced by the Good beyond mind and being, and in its turn 

1 Enn. v. 2, 2. 

2 Enn. V. 1, 6: TrepiKafxxpiv £% avrov /j,4v, e| avrov 5e ixhovros, olov rfhiov rb 
irepl avrov \ap.irpbv <pus irepidiov, £% avrov del yevpu)/j.evoi> [xevovros. 



56 THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM [CH. 

produces Soul 1 . This historical derivation, as we have seen, 
was accepted by Porphyry. Plotinus goes on to interpret 
earlier philosophers from the same point of view. He recog- 
nises, however, that the distinctions between the One in its 
different senses drawn by the Platonic Parmenides were not 
made with that exactitude by Parmenides himself. Aristotle, 
he says, coming later, makes the primal reality separable in- 
deed and intelligible, but deprives it of the first rank by the 
assertion that it thinks itself. To think itself belongs to Mind, 
but not to the One 2 . 

As in the nature of things there are three principles, so also 
with us 3 . For there is reality in this world of ours, and not 
a mere semblance. The virtue and knowledge here are not 
simply images of archetypes yonder in the intelligible world. 
If indeed we take the world here not as meaning simply the 
visible aspect of things, but as including also the soul and 
what it contains, everything is "here" that is "there 4 ." 

The order of first, second and third in the intelligible prin- 
ciples is not spatial 5 . In the intelligible order, body may be 
said to be in soul, soul in mind, and mind in the One 6 . By 
such expressions is to be understood a relation of dependence, 
not the being in a place in the sense of locality. If any one 
objects that place can mean nothing but boundary or interval 
of space, let him dismiss the word and apply his understanding 
to the thing signified 7 . The incorporeal and unext ended in" 
which extended body participates is not to be thought of as a 
point; for mass, which includes an infinity of points, partici- 
pates in it. Nor yet must we think of it as stretched out over 
the whole of the mass; but of the whole extended mass as 
participating in that which is itself without spatial interval 8 . 

1 Enn. V. 1, 8: uxrre HKdruva ddevai 4k /xei> rayadov tov vovv, ck de tov vov 
T7]V \f/vxw> 

2 Enn. v. 1, 9. 

3 Enn. v. 1, 10: aicnrep 8e ev rr} <pijo~et, rpirrb. ravrd ecrri r& elprj/xeva, ovtco XPV 
vo^eiv koli Trap' rjpuv ravra elvai. 

4 Enn. V. 9, 13: rravra evravda, ocra Kanei. 

5 Enn. vi. 5, 4. 6 Enn. v. 5, 9. 

7 Enn. VI. 4, 2: ttjv tov opofMaros d0eis Kariryoplav rrj Scavola to Xeyofievov 
XapLftaveTu. 

8 Enn. vi. 4, 13. 



V] • OF PLOTINUS 57 

This is the general relation of the visible to the intelligible 
world. As non-spatial dependence and implication, we have 
found that it runs through the intelligible causes themselves. 

In what relates to the difference between the extended and 
the unextended, the character of intelligible being is already 
perfectly determinate not only in soul, but in soul as the 
principle of organic life. For that principle transcends the 
opposition between small and great. If it is to be called small 
as having no extension of its own, it may equally be called 
great as being adequate to the animation of the whole body 
with which it is connected, while this is growing in bulk 1 . The 
soul is all in the germ; yet in a manner it contains the full- 
grown plant or animal. In itself it undergoes no change of 
dimensions. Though the principle of growth, it does not grow ; 
nor, when it causes motion, is it moved in the motion which it 
causes 2 . 

The primal One from which all things are is everywhere and 
nowhere. As being the cause of all things, it is everywhere. 
As being other than all things, it is nowhere. If it were only 
"everywhere," and not also "nowhere," it would be all things 3 . 
No predicate of being can be properly applied to it. To call it 
the cause is to predicate something, not of it but of ourselves, 
who have something from it while it remains in itself 4 . This 
is not the "one" that the soul attains by abstracting from 
magnitude and multitude till it arrives at the point and the 
arithmetical unit. It is greatest of all, not by magnitude but 
by potency ; in such a manner that it is also by potency that 
which is without magnitude. It is to be regarded as infinite, 
not because of the impossibility of measuring or counting it, 
but because of the impossibility of comprehending its power 5 . 
It is perfectly self-sufficing; there is no good that it should 
seek to acquire by volition. It is good not in relation to itself, 
but to that which participates in it. And indeed that which 

1 Enn. VI. 4, 5: fiaprvpei 5e rep /xeydXcp ttjs ipvxys ko.1 to fxei^ovo's rod 8jkov 
yivo/nevov (pddveiv £irl ttoLv avrov rr\v avrrjv ipvxWi V ^ w ^Xdrrovos oyxov rjv. 

2 Enn. in. 6, 4. 3 Enn. in. 9, 3. 
Enn. vi. 9, 3. 

5 Enn. VI. 9, 6 : Xr/irreov 5£ /cat direcpov avrb ov rip ddte^LT-qTip rj rod /u-eyedovs 
7) rod dpid/biov, dXXd r(p dTrepiX^TTTip rrjs dwd/xecos. 



58 THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM [CH. 

imparts good is not properly to be called "good," but "the 
Good " above all other goods. " That alone neither knows, nor 
has what it does not know; but being One present to itself it 
needs not thought of itself." Yet in a sense it is all beings 
because all are from it 1 ; and it generates the thought that is 
one with being. As it is the Good above all goods, so, though 
without shape or form, it possesses beauty above beauty. The 
love of it is infinite; and the power or vision by which mind 
thinks it is intellectual love 2 . 

Any inconsistency there might appear to be in making as- 
sertions about the One is avoided by the position that nothing 
— not even that it "is" any more than that it is "good" — is 
to be affirmed of it as a predicate. The names applied to it 
are meant only to indicate its unique reality 3 . The question 
is then raised, whether this reality is best indicated by names 
that signify freedom, or chance, or necessity. Before we can 
know whether an expression signifying freedom (to e<£' tj/jlIv) 
may be applied in any sense to the gods and to God (e7r! deovs 
zeal en fjLaXkov irrl deov), we must know in what sense it is 
applicable to ourselves 4 . If we refer that which is in our power 
to will (/3ov\r](7i<;), and place this in right reason (iv \6y(p 
opOrp), we may — by stretching the terms a little — reach the 
conclusion that an unimpeded theoretic activity such as we 
ascribe in its perfection to the gods who live according to 
mind, is properly called free. The objection that to be free in 
this sense is to be " enslaved to one's own nature " is dismissed 
with the remark that that only is enslaved which, being with- 
held by something else, has it not in its power to go towards 
the good 5 . The view that seems implied in the objection, 
namely, that freedom consists in action contrary to the nature 
of the agent, is an absurdity 6 . But to the supreme principle, 
from which all things have being and power of their own, how 
can the term be applied in any sense? The audacious thought 
might be started that it "happens to be" as it is, and is not 

1 Enn. VI. 7, 32 : otidep ovv tovto tQv ovtuv Kai iravra ' ovdev /jl4p, otl varepa 
to. 6vtcl, iravra 8e, otl e£ avrov. 

2 Enn. vi. 7, 35. Plotinus's actual expression is vovs epuv. 

3 Enn. vi. 7, 38. 4 Enn. vi. 8, 1. 
5 Enn. vi. 8, 4. 6 Enn. vi. 8, 7. 



v] OF PLOTINUS 59 

master of what it is, but is what it is, not from itself; and so, 
that it has no freedom, since its doing or not doing what it 
has been necessitated to do or not to do, is not in its own 
power. To this the reply is, that we cannot say that the 
primal cause is by chance, or that it is not master of its 
origin; because it has not come to be 1 . The whole difficulty 
seems to arise from our positing space (^copav ica\ tottov) as a 
kind of chaos, and then introducing the principle into our 
imaginary space; whereupon we inquire whence and how it 
came there 2 . We get rid of the difficulty by assigning to the 
One no place, but simply the being as it is, — and this because 
we are bound so to express ourselves by necessity of speech. 
Thus, if we are to speak of it at all, we must say that it is 
lord of itself and free. Yet it must be allowed that there is 
here a certain impropriety, for to be lord of itself belongs 
properly to the essence (ova la) identical with thought, and 
the One is before this essence 3 . With a similar impropriety, 
its will and its essence may be said to be the same. Each 
particular being, striving after its good, wills that more than 
to be what it is, and then most thinks that it is, when it par- 
ticipates in the good. It wills even itself, so far only as it has 
the good. Carry this over to the Good which is the principle 
of all particular goods, and its will to be what it is, is seen to 
be inseparable from its being what it is. In this mode of 
speech, accordingly, — having to choose between ascribing to 
it on the one hand will and creative activity in relation to 
itself, on the other hand a contingent relation which is the 
name of unreason, — we must say, not that it is "what it 
happened to be," but that it is "what it willed to be 4 ." We 
might say also that it is of necessity what it is, and could 
not be otherwise; but the more exact statement is, not that 
it is thus because it could not be otherwise, but because the 
best is thus. It is not taken hold of by necessity, but is itself 

1 Enn. vi. 8, 7 : to 5e irpuTov ovre Kara rtixw ^ u ^yoiftev, otire ov Kvpiov rrjs 
avrov yevtaeus, otl firjde yiyove. 

2 Enn. vi. 8, 11. 3 Enn. vi. 8, 12. 

4 Enn. VI. 8, 13: wore oi>x oirep '4t\)x£v eariv, dXX' oirep r)fiov\r)dT) avrds. Cf. 
c. 20: avros io~ri /ecu 6 ira.p6.ywv eavrov. 



60 THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM [CH. 

the necessity and law of other things 1 . It is love, and the 
object of love, and love of itself 2 . That which as it were de- 
sires and that which is desired are one 3 . When we, observing 
some such nature in ourselves, rise to this and become this 
alone, what should we say but that we are more than free 
and more than in our own power? By analogy with mind, it 
may be called operation (ivipyr)/jLa) and energy. Its energy 
and as it were waking (olov iyprfyopcns) are eternal 4 . Reason 
and mind are derived from the principle as a circle from its 
centre 5 . To allow that it could not make itself other than it 
did, in the sense that it can produce only good and not evil, 
is not to limit its freedom and absolute power. The power 
of choice between opposites belongs to a want of power to 
persevere in what is best 6 . The One and Good alone is in 
truth free; and must be thought and spoken of, though in 
reality beyond speech and thought, as creating itself by its 
own energy before all being 7 . 

To the question, why the One should create anything be- 
yond itself, Plotinus answers that since all things, even those 
without life, impart of themselves what they can, the most 
perfect and the first good cannot remain in itself as envious, 
and the potency of all things as without power 8 . As that is 
the potency of all things, Mind, which it first generates, is all 
things actually. For knowledge of things in their immaterial 
essence is the things themselves 9 . Mind knows its objects not, 
like perception, as external, but as one with itself 10 . Still this 
unity, as has been said, involves the duality of thinking and 

1 Enn. vi. 8, 10. 

2 Enn. VI. 8, 15: /ecu ipdafiiov /cat epws 6 avrbs /cat avrov Zpus. 

3 Ibid. : to olov e<piefievov np etpeTuj ev. 

4 Enn. vi. 8, 16. 5 Enn. vi. 8, 18. 

6 Enn. VI. 8, 21: /cat yap to to. avTiKei/xeva bvvacrdat. aSvvafxias ecrrt tou eiri 
tov apicTTov fxeveiv. 

7 Since it is energy in the Aristotelian sense, or complete realisation, it is 
dvevep-/7]Tov. That is, there is no higher realisation to which it can proceed. 
Cf. Enn. V. 6, 6: 6'Aws fj.kv yap ovde/j.ia evepyeia exet aS wa\iv ivepyeiav. In this 
sense, it is said (Enn. I. 7, 1) to be beyond energy (irreKeiva ivepyeias). 

8 Enn. v. 4, 1. 

9 Enn. v. 4, 2. Cf. Enn. v. 9, 5: r\ t&v dvev v\tjs eiri o-ttj/jlt} Tai)Tov Tip 
Trpa.yiJ.aTi. 

10 Enn. v. 5, 1. 



V] OF PLOTINUS 61 

being thought, and hence is not the highest, but the second 
in order, of the supramundane causes. Within its indivisible 
unity it contains the archetype of the whole visible world and 
of all that was or is or is to be existent in it. The relation of 
its Ideas to the whole of Mind resembles that of the pro- 
positions of a science to the sum of knowledge which consists 
of them. By this comparison, which frequently recurs, 
Plotinus seeks to convey the notion of a diversity in unity 
not expressed as local separation of parts l . The archetype of 
the world being thus existent, the world in space is necessarily 
produced because its production is possible. We shall see this 
"possibility" more exactly formulated in the theory of matter. 
The general statement is this: that, since there is the "intelli- 
gential and all-potent nature" of mind, and nothing stands 
between that and the production of a world, there must be a 
formed world corresponding to the formative power. In that 
which is formed, the ideas are divided ; in one part of space the 
idea of the sun takes shape, in another the idea of man. The 
archetype embraces all in its unity without spatial division 2 . 
Thus, while supramundane intellect contains all real being, 
it has also the productive power by which the essential forms 
of things are made manifest in apparent separation from itself 
and from one another. Differences, so far as they belong to 
the real being, or "form," of things here, are produced by pre- 
existent forms in the ideal world. So far as they are merely 
local and temporal, they express only a necessary mode of 
manifestation of being, under the condition of appearing at 
a greater degree of remoteness from the primal cause. What 
then is the case with individuality? Does it consist merely in 
differences of position in space and time, the only true reality 
being the ideal form of the "kind"; or are there ideal forms 
of individuals? Plotinus concludes decisively for the latter 
alternative 3 . There are as many formal differences as there 

1 See for example Enn. v. 9, 8. 

2 Enn. V. 9, 9: 0tfcrews voepds /cat iravTodvudfiov o-uarjs teal ovdevbs dieipyovros, 
fxrjdevbs 6vtos fiera^v rotirov xal tov d^aadai Svvafievov, dvdyKiq to /xh KoafJLrjdTJvai, 
to 8e Koa-firjaai. /cat to fxev Koapvr\dkv e"x eL T <> e ?5os /J.e/J.e pur fifrov, dXXaxov avdpwirov 
/cat dXXaxoO rfkiov ' to 8£ eu evi irdvTa. 

3 See especially Enn. v. 7 : Tlepl tov el icai twv ko.& > ^/cacrra &ttij' etdrj. 



62 THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM [CH. 

are individuals, and all pre-exist in the intelligible world. 
What must be their mode of pre- existence we know from the 
nature of Intellect as already set forth. All things there are 
together yet distinct. Universal mind contains all particular 
minds; and each particular mind expresses the whole in its 
own manner. As Plotinus says in one of those bursts of en- 
thusiasm where his scientific doctrine passes into poetry: 
"They see themselves in others. For all things are trans- 
parent, and there is nothing dark or resisting, but every one 
is manifest to every one internally and all things are mani- 
fest; for light is manifest to light. For every one has all 
things in himself and again sees in another all things, so that 
all things are everywhere and all is all and each is all, and 
the splendour is infinite. For each of them is great, since the 
small also is great. And the sun there is all the stars, and 
again each and all are the sun. In each, one thing is pre- 
eminent above the rest, but it also shows forth all 1 ." The 
wisdom that is there is not put together from separate acts 
of knowledge, but is a single whole. It does not consist of 
many brought to one; rather it is resolved into multitude 
from unity. By way of illustration Plotinus adds that the 
Egyptian sages, whether they seized the truth by accurate 
knowledge or by some native insight, appear to have ex- 
pressed the intuitive character of intellectual wisdom in 
making a picture the sign of each thing 2 . 

In the intelligible world identical with intellect, as thus con- 
ceived, the time and space in which the visible world appears, 
though not "there" as such, pre-exist in their causes. So too, 
in the rational order, does perception, before organs of per- 
ception are formed. This must be so, Plotinus urges, because 
perception and its organs are not a product of deliberation, 
but are present for example in the pre-existent idea of man, 
by an eternal necessity and law of perfection, their causes 
being involved in the perfection of mind 3 . Not only man, 
but all animals, plants and elements pre-exist ideally in the 

1 Enn. v. 8, 4. 2 Enn. v. 8, 6. This is quite an isolated reference to Egypt. 

3 Enn. VI. 7, 3: ZyiceiTaL to alffdrjTucbp elvai kolI ovtws aladrjTLKOP iv r£ e?5et 

virb aidiov dvdyKTjs kcli Te\etoTr)Tos, vov iv clvtu) exo^ros, eiwep reXeios, tcls curtas. 



v] OF PLOTINUS 63 

intelligible world. For infinite variety is demanded in order 
that the whole, as one living being, may be perfect in all its 
parts and to the utmost degree. There, the things we call 
irrational pre-exist in their rational laws 1 . Nor is the thing 
here anywhere really mindless. We call it so when it is with- 
out mind in act ; but each part is all in potency, depending as 
it does on its ideal cause. In the order of ideal causes there is 
as it were a stream of living beings from a single spring; as if 
all sensible qualities were combined in one quality without 
losing their distinctions 2 . The particular is not merely the 
one particular thing that it is called. Rational division of it 
always brings something new to light; so that, in this sense, 
each part of the whole is infinite 3 . This infinity, whether of 
whole or part, is one of successive involution. The process of 
division is not that of bisection, but is like the unfolding of 
wrappings 4 . The w r hole intelligible world may be presented 
to imagination as a living sphere figured over with every kind 
of living countenance 5 . 

Universal mind involves the essence of every form of reason, 
in one Reason as it were, great, perfect, embracing all (el? olov 
\6yos, fieyas, reXeios, Travras ire pU^cov). As the most exact 
reasoning would calculate the things of nature for the best, 
mind has all things in the rational laws that are before reason- 
ing 6 . Each thing being what it is separately, and again all 
things being in one together, the complex as it were and com- 
position of all as they are in one is Mind 7 . In the being that 

1 Enn. VI. 7, 9: e/cet 5e /cat to dXoyov Xeyo/xevov Xoyos fyt, /cat to avow vovs rjv, 
iirel /cat 6 voQv lirirov vovs £<tti, /cat 7? vorjcns 'lttttov vovs rjv, 

2 Enn. VI. 7, 12: olov e't'rts rjv TroioTr/s fxla irdaas iv ai>Trj exovcra /cat cru^ofcra 
ras 7roLOTr}Tas, yXvKVTr/s per evoidlas, /cat 6/xov olvudrjs itolottjs /cat xu\tDi> airdvTwv 
5vvd/j.eis /cat xpw/xdra/i' oi/'ets /cat 6<ra d0at yivucrKOVcriv. eaTioaav 5e /cat 6Va d/coat 
aKoiovaL, irdvTa /xiXrj /cat pvOfibs was. 

3 Enn. VI. 7, 13: vovs...ov...TavTov /cat ev tl iv fiepei, dXXd irdvTa' eirel /cat to 
iv fxipei av ovx £"> dXXd /cat tovto drretpov diaipov/ievov. Cf. Enn. VI. 5, 5 on the 
infinite nature (aireipos <pv<ns) of being. 

4 Enn. VI. 7, 14: fxr) kolt evdv, dXX' ets to ivTos del. 

5 Enn. vi. 7, 15 fin. 

6 Enn. VI. 2, 21 : <bs yap av 6 d/cpt/3ecrraTos Xoyurfjibs XoylcratTO ws apicrra, ovtojs 
«?X et TrdvTa iv rots Xbyois irpb Xoyicrfiov odo~i. 

7 Enn. VI. 2, 21 : xw/hs fiev e/cdarwz/ a Zgtiv ovtwv, bfxov §' av iv evl ovtuv, rj 
irdvTwv iv evl ovtwv olov avfirrXoKr] /cat cvvdeais vovs eaTt. 



64 THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM [CH. 

is mind, all things are together, not only undivided by position 
in space, but without reference to process in time. This 
characteristic of intellectual being may be called "eternity 1 ." 
Time belongs to Soul, as eternity to Mind 2 . Soul is necessarily 
produced by Mind, as Mind by the primal One 3 . Thus it is 
in contact at once with eternal being, and with the temporal 
things which it generates by the power it receives from its 
cause. Having its existence from supramundane intellect, it 
has reason in act so far as that intellect is contemplated by it 4 . 
The Soul of the whole is perpetually in this relation to Mind ; 
particular souls undergo alternation; though even of them 
there is ever something in the intelligible world 5 . Soul has 
for its work, not only to think — for thus it would in no way 
differ from pure intellect — but to order and rule the things 
after it. These come to be, because production could not stop 
at intelligibles, the last of which is the rational soul, but must 
go on to the limit of all possible existence 6 . 

In the relation of the many souls to the one which includes 
all, Soul imitates Mind. It too is necessarily pluralised; and 
in the inherent distinctions of the particular souls their coming 
to birth under different sensible manifestations is already ne- 
cessitated. The one soul is the same in all, as in each part of a 
system of knowledge the whole is potentially present 7 . To 
soul, the higher intellect furnishes the reasons of all its 
operations 8 . Knowledge in the rational soul, so far as it is of 

1 Enn. m. 7, 4: avrr) r) biadecns avrov /cat cpticris elr\ av aliov. 

2 Enn. m. 7, 11. Cf. Enn. rv. 4, 15: aluv p.ev rrepl vovv, xpbvos be rrepl -^vxw. 

3 Enn. V. 1, 7: \pvxw 7<*P yevvg. vovs, vovs icv reKeios. /cat yap reXeiov 5vra 
yevvav ebei, /cat pjr\ 5vvap.Lv ovaav roo~avrr)v ayovov elvai. 

4 Enn. V. 1, 3: r\ re ovv virboracns avrrj airb vov 6 re evepyela \6yos vov avrrj 
bpiopiivov. 

5 Enn. rv. 8, 8 : ov rrava ovb' rj rjpierepa ipvxv fbv, dXX' eo~ri ri avrrjs ev rip voyrip 
aei....ira.cra yap rpvxv e%et ri /cat rov k&tio Trpbs rb acopia /cat rov avio irpbs vovv. 

6 Enn. rv. 8, 3: rrpocrXa^ovo'a yap rip voepa elvai /cat ctXAo, /cat?' d rr\v olicelav 
eVxev viroaTaaiv, vovs ovk %p.eivev, e'x« re tpyov aal avrrj, eiirep /cat ttoLv, 6 av y rCov 
ovtojv. pXeirovaa be rrpbs p.ev to irpb eavrrjs voeX, els be eavrriv o~wfei eavrrfv, els be 
to yuer' airryv Koap-et re /cat bioiKei /cat apxet avrov' ori p,r)be olbv re rjv arrival ra 
rravra iv rep vorjrip, bwapt-ivov ecpe^rjs /cat &\\ov yeveadai iXdrrovos p.ev, avaynaiov 
be elvai, eitrep /cat to irpb avrov. 7 Enn. IV. 9, 5. 

8 Enn. rv. 9, 3. When the general soul impresses form on the elements of 
the world, vovs is the x°PVy° s T ^> v Xbyiov. 



V] OF PLOTINUS 65 

intelligibles, is each thing that it thinks, and has from within 
both the object of thought and the thinking (to re vorjTov tt)v 
76 vot]<tlv), since mind is within 1 . Plotinus fully recognises 
the difficulty of the question: How, if Being and Mind and 
Soul are everywhere numerically one, and not merely of the 
same formal essence (o/AoetSe?), can there yet be many beings 
and minds and souls 2 ? The answer, in the case of soul, as of 
mind and being, is that the one is many by intrinsic differ- 
ence, not by local situation (krep6rriTi,ov tottcd). The plurality 
of souls, as has been said, is in the rational order prior to 
their embodiment. In the Soul of the Whole, the many souls 
are present to one another without being alienated from them- 
selves. They are not divided by spatial limits — just as the 
many portions of knowledge in each soul are not — and the 
one can contain in itself all. After this manner the nature of 
soul is infinite 3 . The general soul can judge of the individual- 
ised affections in each without becoming conscious to itself 
in each that it has passed judgment in the rest also 4 . Each 
of us is a whole for himself, yet all of us, in the reality that is 
all, are together one. Looking outward, we forget our unity. 
Turning back upon ourselves, either of our own accord or 
seized upon as the goddess seized the hair of Achilles, we 
behold ourselves and the whole as one with the God within 5 . 
The soul is the principle of life and motion to all things ; 
motion being an image of life in things called lifeless. The 
heaven is one by the power of soul, and this world is divine 
through it 6 . The soul of the whole orders the world in accord- 
ance with the general reasons of things, as animal bodies are 
fashioned into "microcosms" under the particular law of the 
organism 7 . It creates not by deliberative intelligence, like 

1 Enn. v. 9, 7. 2 Enn. vi. 4, 4. 

3 Enn. VI. 4, 4 fin. : ovrm early aireipos i] roiairrr; 0tf<ris. 

4 Enn. VI. 4, 6: 5ta tl ovv ov avvaicrdaveTai r? eripa rrjs eripas Kpi/xa; rj 8ti Kpiais 
earip, d\X' ov irados. elra ovd' avrrj 77 KpLvacra /ce'/cpt/ea X^yei, ctXX' eKpive /xovov. 

5 Enn. VI. 5, 7: ££w pkv odv opCopres 7} odev e£rip.p.eda ayvoov/j.ev £V fivres, olov 
TrpoGwira iroWa els to ££w Kopvcprjv e'x ovTa ets ro etVw fxiav. el Be tls e"Kiarpa.^>r]vai 
dvvaiTO 77 7rap' avrov rj ttjs 'Adrjuas avrrjs evTvxM -^ T VS e'As ccy s> 6z° v T€ ^al avrbv 
/cat to irav 6\}/eTai. 6 Enn. v. 1, 2. 

7 Enn. rv. 3, 10: ola /ecu oi ev airepixaai X6701 ifkaTTovcri. /ecu fxop<povai ret ^a 
olov /ULiKpofc Tivas Koo-p.ovs. 

w. 5 



66 THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM [CH. 

human art, which is posterior and extrinsic. In the one soul 
are the rational laws of all explicit intelligence — "of gods and 
of all things." "Wherefore also the world has all 1 ." 

Individual souls are the intrinsic laws of particular minds 
within the universal intellect, made more explicit 2 . Not only 
the soul of the whole, but the soul of each, has all things in 
itself 3 . Wherein they differ, is in energising with different 
powers. Before descent and after reascent of the particular 
soul, each one's thoughts are manifest to another as in direct 
vision, without discourse 4 . Why then does the soul descend 
and lose knowledge of its unity with the whole? For the 
choice is better to remain above 5 . The answer is that the 
error lies in self-will 6 . The soul desires to be its own, and so 
ventures forth to birth, and takes upon itself the ordering of a 
body which it appropriates, or rather, which appropriates it, 
so far as that is possible. Thus the soul, although it does not 
really belong to this body, yet energises in relation to it, and 
in a manner becomes a partial soul in separation from the 
whole 7 . 

But what is finally the explanation of this choice of the 
worse, and how is it compatible with the perfection of the 
mundane order? How is the position of the Phaedo, that the 
body is a prison, and the true aim of the soul release from it, 
reconcilable with the optimism of the Timaeusl The answer 
is that all — descent and reascent alike — has the necessity of a 
natural law. The optimism has reference to the whole order. 
Of this order, such as it must be in a world that is still good 
though below the intelligible and perfectly stable supramun- 
dane order, temporary descent, dissatisfaction with the con- 
sequences of the descent, and the effort to return, are all 
conditions. Any expression that seems to imply arbitrariness 
at any point, is part of the mythological representation. Thus 

1 Enn. rv. 3, 10 fin. 

2 Enn. rv. 3, 5: \byoi vdv o$<rai ical e^eCkiy^ivai fiaWov ?} 4k€ivol...to ravrov 
teal erepov crw^ovaai /xeuei re eKdarrj £v, ical 6/jlov eV iraaai. 

3 Enn. iv. 3, 6. 

4 Enn. rv. 3, 18 : olov 6(p9a\p.b$ '<■ Karros kol ovbh 5e Kpvrrrbv ovdk ireirkdcr^hov, 
d\\a irp\v direiv aXKcp I8uv iKelvos Zyvu). 

5 Enn. rv. 3, 14. 6 Enn. v. 1, 1. 7 Enn. vi. 4, 16. 



V] OF PLOTINUS 67 

when in the Timaeus it is said that God "sows" the souls, 
this is mythical, just as when he is represented as haranguing 
them 1 . Necessity and self-caused descent are not discordant. 
The soul does not go by its will to that which is worse; yet 
its course is its own 2 . And it must expiate both the original 
error, and any evil that it may do actually. Of the first, the 
mere change of state is the punishment ; to the second, further 
chastisement is assigned. The knowledge acquired below is a 
good, and the soul is not to be blamed overmuch if in its 
regulation of sensible nature it goes a little beyond what is 
safe for itself 3 . On the other hand, a slight inclination at the 
beginning to the w r orse, if not immediately corrected, may 
produce a permanent disposition 4 . Be the error light or grave, 
it comes under an undeviating law of justice. To the particu- 
lar bodies fitted for them, the souls go neither by voluntary 
choice nor sent, but as by some natural process for which they 
are ready. The universal law under which the individual falls 
is not outside but within each 5 . The notion that there may be 
in small things an element of contingency which is no part of 
the order, is suggested but not accepted 6 . The whole course 
of the soul through its series of bodily lives, and its release 
from the body when this is attained, are alike necessarily 
determined 7 . The death of the soul, so far as the soul can die, 
is to sink to a stage below moral evil — which still contains a 
mixture of the opposite good — and to be wholly plunged in 
matter 8 . Even thence it may still somehow emerge; though 
souls that have descended to the world of birth need not all 

1 Enn. rv. 8, 4. 2 Enn. rv. 8, 5. 

3 Enn. rv. 8, 7: 7^^0-1? yap evapyeaT^pa Tayadov 17 rod /ca/cou tretpa ols tj 
Mvafxis dadeveo-Te'pa, rj wVre iTHTT^fiy to kclkov irpb ireipas yvuvai. 

4 Enn. in. 2, 4. Cf. m. 3, 4: /cat apa/cpa poirT) dp/cet els Zicftacriv rod opdov. 

5 Enn. iv. 3, 13. 

6 Enn. rv. 3, 16: ov yap tcl p.ev del vop.lfeiv o-vvreraxdai, rd Se AcexaXda-tfat els 
to avTe^otiaiov. el yap /car' at'rtas yiveadai Set ical (pvcnxds dtcoXovdias koI Kara 
\byov eva teal ra^iv /xiav, koI rd crfiiKporepa del cvvrerdxQo.i /cat crvvvcpdvdai vo/Mifeiv. 

. 7 Enn. rv. 3, 24: (ptperai 8t nal avrbs 6 irdax^v ayvoQv e<f>' a iradelv trpoo-qKei, 
acrTaTLp (lev rrj (fropq. -rravraxov aliopov/uLevos reus wXdvais, reXeurwi' 8e uio-irep 7ro\\a 
Kap.uv ols dvTereivev els rbv Trpoo"f)KovTa avrip rbirov eviirecrev, eKovaicp rrj <f>opq. to 
duovo-iov els to iradelv ?x w "- Cf. Enn. rv. 4, 45. 

8 Enn. I. 8, 13: /cat tovto i&Ti to iv adov eXdbvra eirLKaTabapdelv . Cf. Enn. 
I. 6, 6. 

5—2 



68 THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM [CH. 

make the full circle, but may return before reaching the 
lowest point 1 . 

Here we come to the metaphysical doctrine by which 
Plotinus explains the contrasts the visible world presents. 
Neither moral good nor evil is with him ultimate. Of virtues, 
even the highest, the cause is the Good, which in reality is 
above good (v7repdya0ov). Of moral evil, so far as it is purely 
evil, the cause is that principle of absolute formlessness and 
indeterminateness called Matter. At the same time, matter 
is the receptive principle by which alone the present world 
could be at all. Evils accordingly are an inevitable con- 
stituent of a world that is subject in its parts to birth and 
change. And indeed without evil there can be no good in our 
sense of the term. Nor is there evil unmixed in the things of 
nature, any more than there is unformed matter. Whence 
then is this principle opposed to form and unity? 

That Matter is an independently existing principle over 
against the One, Plotinus distinctly denies. The supposition 
is put as inadmissible that there are dp^al TrXeiovs ical Kara 
<rvvTV)(lav ra 7rpa>ra 2 . Matter is the infinite (to aireipov) in 
the sense of the indeterminate (to aopiarov), and is generated 
from the infinity of power or of eternal existence that is an 
appanage of the One, which has not in itself indeterminate- 
ness, but creates it 3 . To the term " infinite " in the sense of an 
actual extent or number that is immeasurable (dhie^irr]Tov), 
or of a quantitative infinite (Kara rb iroabv aireipov), there is 
nothing to correspond. Matter, in itself indeterminate, is that 
of which the nature is to be a recipient of forms. Like intel- 
ligible being, it is incorporeal and unextended. Place, indeed, 
is posterior both to matter and bodies 4 . By its absolute want 
of all form, that is, of all proper being, matter is at the opposite 
extreme to things intelligible, and is in its own nature ugly 
and evil 5 . It receives, indeed, all determinations, but it can- 

1 Enn. iv. 4, 5 fin. 2 Enn. n. 4, 2. 

3 Enn. n. 4, 15: etrj av yevvrjdev e/c tt)s tou evbs direipias rj dvvd/xews 77 tov del, 
ovk oi)<nis €v eicelvu) aTrecpias dXXa tolovvtos. 

4 Enn. n. 4, 12: 6 5e tottos Harepos Tr)s[v\rjs Kal tQi> aojixdruv. 

5 Enn. n. 4, 16. 



V] OF PLOTINUS 69 

not receive them indivisibly (anepw). One form in matter 
excludes another; so that they appear as separated by spatial 
intervals 1 . The reason of this is precisely that matter has no 
determination of its own. The soul in taking up the forms of 
things perceptible, views them with their mass put away 
(airoOefieva tgv oytcov opa), because by its own form it is in- 
divisible, and therefore cannot receive the extended as such. 
Since matter, on the contrary, has no form of its own by which 
to unite distinctions, the intrinsic differences of being must be 
represented in it by local separation. Yet, since the intelligible 
world is in a sense a " world," and is many as well as one, it too 
must have a kind of matter 2 . This " intelligible matter " is the 
recipient of formal diversities in the world of being; as sensible 
matter is the recipient of the varied appearances in space. 
The matter of the intelligible world, differing in this respect 
from matter properly so-called, does not receive all forms in- 
differently; the same matter there having always the same 
form 3 . The matter "here" is thus more truly "the indeter- 
minate" than the matter "there"; which, in so far as it has 
more real being, is so much less truly " matter 4 ." Matter itself 
may best be called "not-being 5 ." As the indeterminate, it is 
only to be apprehended by a corresponding indeterminateness 
of the soul 6 — a difficult state to maintain, for, as matter itself 
does not remain unformed in things, so the soul hastens to 
add some positive determination to the abstract formlessness 
reached by analysis. To be the subject and recipient ever 
ready for all forms, it must be indestructible and impassible, 
as it is incorporeal and unextended. It is like a mirror which 
represents all things so that they seem to be where they are 
not, and keeps no impression of any 7 . The appearances of 
sense, themselves "invulnerable nothings 8 ," go through it as 
through water without dividing it. It has not even a falsehood 

1 Enn. m. 6, 18. 2 Enn. n. 4, 4. 

3 Enn. n. 4, 3: 77 de tQv ycvo/xevojv v\r) del a\\o /ecu aWo eWos urxei» tuv 8e 
didiojv i) avTT] ravrbv del. 

4 Enn. n. 4, 15. 5 Enn. in. 6, 7. 

6 Enn. n. 4, 10: dopurrla rrjs ^ux^s. Cf. Enn. I. 8, 9. 

7 Enn. m. 6, 7. 

8 Adonais, xxxix. — an exact expression of the idea of Plotinus. 



70 THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM [CH. 

of its own that it can say of things 1 . In that it can take no 
permanent hold of any good, it may be called evil 2 . Fleeing 
every attempt of perception to grasp it, it is equally receptive 
in appearance of the contraries which it is equally unable to 
retain. 

3. Cosmology and Theodicy, 

The theory of matter set forth, though turned to new meta- 
physical account, is fundamentally that of Aristotle. As with 
Aristotle, Matter is the presupposition of physics, being viewed 
as the indestructible "subject" of forms, enduring through all 
changes in potency of further change ; but Plotinus is careful 
to point out that the world of natural things derives none of 
its reality from the recipient. The formal reason (^070?) that 
makes matter appear as extended, does not "unfold" it to 
extension — for this was not implicit in it — but, like that also 
which makes it appear as coloured, gives it something that 
was not there 3 . In that it confers no qualities whatever on 
that which appears in it, matter is absolutely sterile 4 . The 
forms manifested in nature are those already contained in 
the intellect that is before it, which acquires them by turning 
towards the Good. All differences of form, down to those of 
the elements, are the product of Reason and not of Matter 5 . 

While working out his theory from a direct consideration 
of the necessity that there should be something indestructible 
beneath the transformations of bod}^, Plotinus tries to prove 
it not inconsistent with what is known as Plato's "theory of 
matter " in the Timaeus. The phrases in which the "recipient" 
is spoken of as a "room" and a "seat" are interpreted meta- 
phorically. Here Plotinus is evidently arguing against com- 
mentators in his own time who took the "Platonic matter" to 
be empty space 6 . This has now become the generally accepted 
interpretation; opinions differing only as to whether the space 
or matter in which the ideas manifest themselves is to be re- 

1 Enn. m. 6, 15. 2 Enn. in. 6, 11. 

3 Enn. n. 4, 9. 4 Enn. in. 6, 19. 

5 Enn. vi. 7, 11. 

6 See especially Enn. 11. 4, 11: 66 ev rives rairbv t<$ Kep$ tt/v vXtjv dp-qnaa. 



V] OF PLOTINUS 71 

garded as objective extension or as a subjective form 1 . Plo- 
tinus himself approaches the latter view when he consents to 
call matter a "phantasm of mass" (fyavracr fia 8e oytcov Xeyco), 
though still regarding it as unextended (ajjieyeOes). His account 
of the mental process by which the nature opposed to that of 
the ideas is known (voOco Xoytafiw) quite agrees with Plato's. 
On another point of Platonic interpretation, Plotinus and 
all his successors take the view which modern criticism seems 
now to find the most satisfactory. Plausible as was the reading 
of the Timaeus which would regard it as teaching an origin of 
the world from an absolute beginning of time, this was never, 
even at the earliest period, really prevalent in the school of 
Plato. During the Platonising movement that preceded Plo- 
tinus, the usual interpretation had been to regard what is said 
about the making of the world from pre-existent elements as 
mythological. The visible universe, said the earliest like the 
latest interpreters, is described by Plato as "generated" be- 
cause it depends on an unchanging principle while itself per- 
petually subject to mutation; not because it is supposed to 
have been called into being at a particular moment. That this 
was all along the authorised interpretation may be seen even 
from Plutarch 2 , who, in defending the opposite thesis, evi- 
dently feels that he is arguing against the opinion predomi- 
nant among contemporary Platonists 3 . Thus Plotinus, when 

1 The first is Zeller's view, in which he is followed by Siebeck and by 
Baeumker (Das Problem deY Materie in der griechischen Philosophie, 1890), 
who have skilfully defended it against objections. Mr Archer-Hind, in his 
edition of the Timaeus, takes the view that the Platonic matter is space as a 
subjective form. This would bring it very close to the Kantian doctrine. The 
more usual view would in effect make it an anticipation of Descartes' attempt 
in the Principia Phihsophiae to construct body out of pure extension. There 
is certainly a striking resemblance in general conception between Plato's and 
Descartes' corpuscular theory: it has been noted by Mr Benn (The Greek 
Philosophers, 1st ed., vol. ii. pp. 388-389). (In the first edition, I omitted to 
make this reference, having forgotten the passage and rediscovered the 
coincidence.) 

2 Hepl T7js €v Ti/JLaicp \j/vxoyovias. 

3 It may be noted that the "Platonic matter," according to Plutarch, is 
simply body or "corporeal substance." rj /xev odv crw/xaros oxxrla ttjs \eyofi&7)s 
ut' ai/Tov iravdexovs (ptiaews edpas re /cat Tidr/vys rdv yevqT&v oi>x ertpa ris effTiv 
(c. 5 fin.). 



72 THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM [CH. 

he says that there never was a time when this whole was not, 
nor was there ever matter unformed, is not introducing a 
novelty. And on this point we do not hear that opposition 
to his doctrine arose from any quarter. His difference with 
Longinus was on the question whether the divine mind 
eternally contains the ideas in itself or contemplates them 
eternally as objective existences; not as to whether ideas and 
unordered matter once stood apart and were then brought 
together by an act or process of creative volition. The dura- 
tion of the universe without temporal beginning or end was 
the accepted doctrine of Hellenic Platonism. 

In accordance with this general view, however, it is possible, 
as Plotinus recognises 1 , to hold either that the universe is per- 
manent only as a whole, while all its parts perish as individual 
bodies (Kara to ro&e) and are renewed only in type (Kara to 
etSo?), or that some of the bodies in the universe — namely, 
those that fill the spaces from the sphere of the moon outwards 
— are always numerically identical. If the former view is the 
true one, then the heavenly bodies differ from the rest only by 
lasting a longer time. About the latter view there would be 
no trouble if we were to accept Aristotle's doctrine that their 
substance is a fifth element, not subject like the rest to altera- 
tion. For those who allow that they consist of the elements of 
which living bodies on earth are constituted, the difficulty is 
that they must be by nature dissoluble. This Plato himself 
conceded to Heraclitus. As in his physics generally, so here, 
Plotinus argues in a rather tentative way. He suggests as the 
true solution, that the heaven with all its parts consists of a 
purer kind of fire, which we may call "light," moving if at all 
with a circular motion, losing nothing by efflux, and conse- 
quently in no need, like mortal bodies, of nourishment from 
without. This material light, being a kind of body, must of 
course be distinguished from light as an outflowing energy 2 . 
Radiant light, as we have seen 3 , is for Plotinus an activity 
carrying with it no loss either of substance or of efficiency; 

1 Enn. n. 1, 1. 

2 Enn. n. 1, 7: to b/xdivvfiov avrip (pQs, 6 b-q (pa/iev ko.1 aaw/n.aTOv elvai. 

3 Cf. Enn. iv. 5. 



v] OF PLOTINUS 73 

whence it furnished an analogy closer than is possible on any 
modern theory for the metaphysical doctrine of emanation. 

For the rest, this picture of the physical universe does not 
essentially differ from Aristotle's. The whole forms a single 
system, with the fixed stars and the seven planets (including 
the sun and moon) revolving round the spherical earth in com- 
binations of perfect circles. Like the stars, the earth too has 
a divinity of its own 1 . The space which the universe fills is 
finite. Body is not atomic in constitution but continuous. 
The complex movements of the whole system recur in astro- 
nomical cycles. In order to solve difficulties connected with 
the infinite duration of a world in constant change, Plotinus 
sometimes takes up the Stoical theory that in the recurrent 
periods the sequence of events is exactly repeated. This he 
does especially where the question presents itself, how that 
infinity in the world of sense is possible which is required by 
his doctrine that there are "ideas of particulars." Individual 
differences, he allows, must according to this view be infinite, 
seeing that there is no limit to the duration of the world either 
in the past or in the future. The difficulty would be met by 
supposing that differences finite in number recur exactly in 
succeeding cycles. Thus, in any one cycle no two individuals 
are without all formal difference, and yet the number of 
"forms" is limited 2 . This solution, however, seems to be 
offered with no great confidence. The point about which 
Plotinus is quite clear is that individual as well as specific 
differences have their rational determination in the ideal 
world. From this he deduces that, in any one period of the 
cosmos at least, there are no two individuals that differ only 
numerically, without a trace of inward distinction 3 . About 
infinity in the ideal world or in the soul there is no difficulty 4 . 
The conception of an actual quantitative infinite is not merely 
difficult, but impossible. 

Yet, while repeatedly laying down this position, Plotinus 
allows that space and number as prefigured in eternal intellect 

1 Enn. iv. 4, 22-27. 2 Enn. v. 7, 2. 3 Enn. v. 7, 3. 

4 Enn. v. 7, 1: tt)v 8e ip r<£ vot)t<£ aweipiav ov 5ec 8e8ieuaf iracra yap ev 
dfiepei. As regards the soul and its \6yoi, cf. c. 3. 



74 THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM [CH. 

have an infinitude of their own. We may say that number is 
infinite, though infinity is repugnant to number (to airetpov 
ILayeTdi rco apiO/Aw), as we speak of an infinite line; not that 
there is any such (oi>x oti earc tl$ roiavrrj), but that we can 
go in thought beyond the greatest existing. This means that 
in intellect the rational law of linear magnitude does not carry 
with it the thought of a limit 1 . Similarly, number in intellect 
is unmeasured. No actual number can be assigned that goes 
beyond what is already involved in the idea of number. In- 
tellectual being is beyond measure because it is itself the 
measure. The limited and measured is that which is prevented 
from running to infinity in its other sense of indeterminate- 
ness 2 . Thus limited and measured is the visible cosmos. 

To time is allowed an explicit infinity that is denied to 
space. It is the "image of eternity," reflecting the infinite 
already existent whole of being by the continual going to 
infinity of successive realisations 3 . Time belongs to apartness 
of life (SidaTCKTis ovv £or)<; y^pbvov el^e). The Soul of the Whole 
generates time and not eternity, because the things it produces 
are not imperishable. It is not itself in time ; nor are individual 
souls themselves, but only their affections and deeds 4 , which 
are really those of the composite nature. Thus the past which 
is the object of memory is in things done; in the soul itself 
there is nothing past 5 . Of Zeus, whether regarded as Demi- 
urgus or as Soul of the World, we must deny even the "before 
and after" implied in memory 6 . That which guides the whole 
(to rjyovfievov rov TravTO?) knows the future as present (Kara 
to eaTavai), and has therefore no need of memory and dis- 
cursive reason to infer it from the past 7 . These faculties be- 
long to acquired intellect, and, as we shall see, are dismissed 

1 Enn. VI. 6, 17: ?) to direipov aWov rpSirov, o£% u>$ adie ZirrjTOv ' dXXd irQs 
direipos; 77 ev ry \6yip rrjs avToypapLfj.7Js otic £vi irpoavoofii±evov irtpas. 

2 Enn. vi. 6, 18. 3 Enn. m. 7, 11. 

4 Enn. iv. 4, 15. 

5 Enn. IV. 4, 16: dXXd xdures oi \6yoi a,ua, dxrirep eLpr)Tai...To Se rode fiera 
rode ev rots Trpdypiacriv ov Bvvafxepois d/xa irdvra.. 

6 Enn. rv. 4, 10. 

7 Enn. iv. 4, 12. Hence, adds Plotinus, the creative power (to ttolovv) is not 
subject to labour and difficulty, as was in the imagination of those who 
thought the regulation of the whole would be a troublesome business. 



V] OF PLOTINUS 75 

even by the individual soul when it has reascended to intuitive 
knowledge. 

If things eternal were altogether alien to us, we could not 
speak of them with intelligence. We also then must participate 
in eternity 1 . How the soul's essence can be in eternity while 
the composite nature consisting of soul and body is in time, 
can only be understood when the definition of time has been 
more strictly investigated. To define it in relation to physical 
movement does not express its essential character. The means 
by which we learn to know time is no doubt observation of 
motion, and especially of the revolutions of the heavenly 
bodies. Yet while ordered external motion more than any- 
thing else shows time forth to mental conception, it does not 
make time be. When the motion of the whole is measured in 
terms of time, which itself is fixed according to certain inter- 
vals marked out in the space through which the motions 
proceed, this is an "accidental" relation. The parts of time, 
invisible and inapprehensible in themselves, must have re- 
mained unknown till thus measured, but time itself is prior 
to the measurement of its parts. We must bring it back 
finally to a movement of the soul, though the soul could 
hardly have known it to any purpose without the movement 
of the heaven. Time is not, however, in the merely individual 
soul, but in all souls so far as they are one. Therefore there 
is one uniform time, and not a multitude of disparate times ; 
as in another relation there is one eternity in which all par- 
ticipate 2 . Thus the one soul, in which individual souls are 
metaphysically contained, participates in eternity and pro- 
duces time, which is the form of a soul living in apparent 
detachment from its higher cause. 

Unity in the soul of the whole, here so strongly insisted on, 
does not with Plotinus exclude the reality of particular souls. 
We have seen that he regards individuality as determined by 
differences in the Ideas, and not by the metaphysically unreal 

1 Enn. m. 7, 7: Set &pa nal rj/uuv nereivai tov alwvos. 

2 Enn. in. 7, 13: ap' oSv koX iv r)puv [6] x/>^os; rj eV '^vxv Ty roiavrrj Trdarj ko.1 
6/j.0€l5Qs iv iracri ical ai iravai fiia. did oi) diavrracrdriaeTcu 6 xpovos' ewei ovd' 6 
alwv 6 kclt &\\o £i> rots o/xoeidiat ttolctlv. 



76 THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM [CH. 

modes of pluralising ascribed to Matter. What comes from 
matter is separateness of external manifestation, and muta- 
bility in the realisations attained; not inner diversity, which 
pre-exists in the world of being. This view he turns against 
the fatalism that would make the agency of the individual 
soul count for nothing in the sum of things. He is without the 
least hesitation a determinist. Within the universal order, he 
premises, the uncaused (to avainov) is not to be received, 
whether under the form of "empty declinations," or of a 
sudden movement of bodies without preceding movement, or 
of a capricious impulse of soul not assignable to any motive 1 . 
But to say that everything in each is determined by one soul 
that runs through all, is, by an excess of necessity, to take 
away necessity itself and the causal order; for in this case it 
would not be true that all comes to pass by causes, but all 
things would be one, without distinction between that which 
causes and that which is caused; "so that neither we are we 
nor is anything our work 2 ." Each must be each, and actions 
and thoughts must belong to us as our own 3 . This is the truth 
that physical, and especially astrological, fatalism denies. To 
preserve the causal order without exception while at the same 
time allowing that we ourselves are something, we must in- 
troduce the soul as another principle into the contexture of 
things, — and not only the soul of the whole, but along with it 
the soul of each 4 . Being in a contexture, and not by itself, it 
is not wholly master, and so far fate or destiny (elfiapfxevr)) 
regarded as external, has a real existence. Thus all things 

1 Enn. m. 1, 1 : 77 yap to fiovXrjTOP — tovto de rj ££w 77 et'crw — 77 to iiridvtirjTdv 
eidvr)o~ev " ij, el fxr/dev opeKTov iidvTicrev, ou5' av 6'Xws etciv-qdr). The principle of 
psychological determinism could not be more clearly put. In view of this, it 
is not a little surprising that Zeller should vaguely class Plotinus and his 
successors as champions of "free-will." On the other hand Jules Simon, who 
quite recognises the determinism of the school, misstates the doctrine of 
Plotinus as regards the nature of the individual when he says (Histoire de 
VEcole d'Alexandrie, t. i. pp. 570-1) that that which is not of the essence of 
each soul, and must consequently perish, is, according to Plotinus, its in- 
dividuality, and that this comes from matter. 

2 Enn. m. 1, 4. 

3 Cf. Enn. in. 4, 6: ov yap 6/uotws iv toIs aureus iras KivelraL 77 j3oi/\eTcu rj 
ivepyel. 

4 Enn. m. 1, 8. 



v] OF PLOTINUS 77 

come to pass according to causes ; but some by the soul, and 
some through the other causes among which it is placed. Of 
its not thinking and acting rationally (rod fir) fypovelv) other 
things are the causes. Rational action has its cause within; 
being only not hindered from without 1 . 

Virtue therefore is free; and the more completely free the 
more the soul is purified from mixture. To the bad, who do 
most things according to the imaginations excited by bodily 
affections, we must assign neither a power of their own nor 
a proper volition 2 . How then can punishment be just? The 
answer is that the composite nature, which sins, is also that 
which pays the penalty of sin 3 . The involuntariness of sin 
(on dfiapTia aKovcnov) does not prevent the deed being from 
the doer 4 . Some men indeed come into being as if by a witch- 
craft of external things, and are little or nothing of them- 
selves : others preserve the original nature of the soul's essence. 
For it is not to be thought that the soul alone of all things is 
without such a nature 5 . In preserving or recovering this lie 
virtue and freedom. 

A more elaborate treatment of the problem of theodicy here 
raised is contained in three books that belong to Plotinus's 
last period 6 . This problem he does not minimise. Although, 
in metaphysical reality, the world has not come to be by a 
process of contrivance resembling human art, yet, he says, if 
reasoning had made it, it would have no reason to be ashamed 
of its work 7 . This whole, with everything in it, is as it would 
be if providentially ordered by the rational choice of the 
Maker 8 . 

If, indeed, the world had come into existence a certain time 
ago, and before was not, then the providence which regulates 

1 Enn. in. 1, 10. 

2 Enn. VI. 8, 3: oi/'re to iir avToTs otire to £ko-u<tlov odoaofxev. 

3 Enn. i. 1, 12. 4 Enn. in. 2, 10. 

5 Enn. II. 3, 15: ov yap 8rj voixio~t£ov toiovtov eZVcu tJ/vxw, olov, b' ri av e'fadev 
Tadrj, to.\jtt\v <pv<xiv <.'o"x ei,/ ^ v,f \ v T & v tt&vtoiv oineiap <pvaiv ovk $x ov <? av - 

6 Enn. m. 2, m. 3, i. 8. 

7 Enn. HI. 2, 3: ou5' el \oyio~/xbs et'77 6 Troirjo-as, cuVxi/peZYcu ry ironjde'vTi. 

8 Enn. vi. 8, 17. 



78 THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM [CH. 

it would be like that of rational beings within the world; it 
would be a certain foresight and reasoning of God how this 
whole should come to exist, and how it should be in the best 
manner possible. Since, however, the world is without begin- 
ning and end, the providence that governs the whole consists 
in its being in accordance with mind, which is before it not in 
time but as its cause and model so to speak. 

From mind proceeds a rational law which imposes harmony 
on the cosmos. This law, however, cannot be unmixed intel- 
lect like the first. The condition of there being a world below 
the purely intelligible order — and there must be such a world, 
that every possible degree of perfection may be realised — is 
mutual hindrance and separation of parts. The unjust deal- 
ings of men with one another arise from an aspiration after 
the good along with a want of power to attain it. Evil is a 
defection (eWen/rj?) of good; and, in a universe of separated 
existences, absence of good in one place follows with necessity 
from its presence in another. Therefore evils cannot be de- 
stroyed from the world. What are commonly called evils, as 
poverty and disease, Plotinus continues to assert with the 
Stoical tradition, are nothing to those who possess true good, 
which is virtue; and they are not useless to the order of the 
whole. Yet, he proceeds, it may still be argued that the dis- 
tribution of what the Stoics after all allow to be things 
"agreeable" and "not agreeable" to nature, is unfair. That 
the bad should be lords and rulers of cities, and that men of 
worth should be slaves, is not fitting, even though lordship 
and slavery are nothing as regards the possession of real good. 
And with a perfect providence every detail must be as it 
ought to be. We are not to evade the difficulty by saying 
that providence does not extend to earth, or that through 
chance and necessity it is not strong enough to sway things 
here. The earth too is as one of the stars (&>? ev tl tcov 
aarpcov) 1 . If, however, we bear in mind that we are to look 
for the greatest possible perfection that can belong to a world 
of mixture, not for that which can belong only to the intelli- 
gible order, the argument may be met in full. Among men 
1 Enn. m. 2, 8. 



v] OF PLOTINUS 79 

there are higher and lower and intermediate natures, — the 
last being the most numerous. Those that are so degenerate 
as to come within the neighbourhood of irrational animals do 
violence to the intermediate natures. These are better than 
those that maltreat them, and yet are conquered by the worse 
in so far as they themselves are worse in relation to the par- 
ticular kind of contest to be undergone. If they are content 
to be fatted sheep, they should not complain of becoming a 
prey to the wolves. And, Plotinus adds parenthetically, the 
spoilers too pay the penalty ; first in being wolves and wretched 
men, and then in having a worse fate after death, according 
to their acquired character. For the complete order of justice 
has regard to the series of past and future lives, not to each 
present life by itself. But to take things as seen in one life: 
always the mundane order demands certain means if we are 
to attain the end. Those who have done nothing worthy of 
happiness cannot reasonably expect to be happy. The law is, 
for example, that out of wars we are to come safe by proving 
our courage, not by prayer. Were the opposite the case, — 
could peace be preserved amid every kind of folly and coward- 
ice, — then indeed would providence be neglectful. When the 
bad rule, it is by the unmanliness of those that are ruled ; and 
it is just that it should be so. Yet, such as man is, holding a 
middle rank, providence does not suffer him to be destroyed, 
but he is borne up ever toward the higher; the divine element 
giving virtue the mastery in the long run. The human race 
participates, if not to the height, in wisdom and mind, and 
art and justice, and man is a beautiful creation so far as he 
can be consistently with his place in the universe. Reason 
(o \6yos) made things in their different orders, not because 
it envied a greater good to those that are lower placed, but 
because the law itself of intelligential existence carries with 
it variety (ov <j)66v(p, d\\d \oy<p TrotKiXlav voepav e^ovn). 
Thus in a drama all the personages cannot be heroes. And 
reason does not take the souls from outside itself and fit them 
into the poem by constraining a portion of them from their 
own nature for the worse. The souls are as it were parts of 
reason itself, and it fits them in not by making them worse, 



80 THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM [CH 

but by bringing them to the place suitable to their nature. 

If then, it may be asked, we are not to explain evil by external 

constraint, but reason is the principle and is all, what is the 

rational necessity of the truceless war among animals and 

men? First, destructions of animals are necessary because, 

in a world composed of changing existences, they could not 

be born imperishable. Thus, if they were not destroyed by 

one another they would no less perish. Transference of the 

animating principle from body to body, which is promoted 

by their devouring each other, is better than that they should 

not have been at all. The ordered battles men fight as if 

dancing the Pyrrhic dance, show that what we take for the 

serious affairs of mankind are but child's play, and declare 

that death is nothing terrible 1 . It is not the inward soul but 

the outward shadow of a man that groans and laments over 

the things of life. But how then, the philosopher proceeds, 

can there be any such thing as wickedness if this is the true 

account? The answer which he ventures 2 is in effect that of 

maleficent natures the Reason in the world might say : " These 

too have their part in me, as I too in these." This reason (outo? 

o X0705) is not unmixed mind (atcparos vovs). Its essence is to 

consist of the contraries that were in need of strife with one 

another so that thus a world of birth might hold together (r-qv 

avcrracTiv avrw /cal olov ovalav t?J? TOLavrrjs ivavnoiaew^ 

<\>epovcrr}s). In the universal drama the good and the bad must 

perform the opposite parts assigned them. But from this does 

it not follow that all is pardonable 3 ? No, answers Plotinus, 

for the reason which is the creative word of the drama fixes 

the place both of pardon and of its opposite ; and it does not 

assign to men as their part that they should have nothing but 

forgiveness for the bad 4 . In the consequences of evil for the 

1 Enn. m. 2, 15: uxrwtp 5e eiri tGjv dearpwv reus aicrjvais, oi/tw XPV KCLL T0 ^ s 
(povovs QeacQai Kai ir&pras davdrovs Kai iroKeuv dAcicrets Kai apirayds, fxeradecreis 
iravra Kai yueracrx^/AaWcrets Kai dp-qvwv /cat olfiuyQv viroKpLcreis. 

2 Enn. in. 2, 16: reroXfirjadu yap' raya 5' &v Kai rOxoip-ev. 

3 "Tout comprendre est tout pardonner." 

4 Enn. m. 2, 17: dXX' i'crws avyyvwfxrj tois /ca/cots' el p.ri Kai to rrjs crvyyvu}pi.r]s 
Kai fxrj 6 X670S 7tol€l' TTOiet Se 6 \6yos fj.r)bk (Xvyypdjfi.ovas iji rots toioijtois 
eli/at. 



V] OF PLOTINUS 81 

whole there is nevertheless a rational order, and an order out 
of which good may come 1 . 

Still, that good may come of evil is not the deepest ground 
of its existence. Some one might argue that evil, while it is 
actual, was not necessary. In that case, even if good comes of 
it, the justification of providence must fail. The reply has 
been given already in outline. The necessity of evil results 
from matter. Matter is necessary because, the principle of 
things having infinite productive power, that power must 
manifest itself in every possible degree : there must therefore 
be a last term, to ea^arov, which can produce nothing beyond 
itself. " This is matter, having nothing any longer of its own; 
and this is the necessity of evil 2 ." If it is argued that moral 
evil in us, coming as it does from association with the body, 
is to be ascribed rather to form than to matter, since bodies 
derive their distinctive character from form, the reply is that 
it is not in so far as the forms are pure that they are the source 
of ignorance and bad desires, but in so far as they are mixed 
with matter (Xoyot evvXoi). The fall of the soul is its approach 
to matter, and it is made weak because its energies are im- 
peded by the presence of matter, which does not allow all its 
powers to arrive at their realisation 3 . Yet without this prin- 
ciple of indeterminateness that vitiates the pure forms, 
causing them to miss their true boundary by excess or defect, 
there would be for us neither good nor any object of desire. 
There would be neither striving after one thing nor turning 
away from another nor yet thought. "For our striving is 
after good and our turning away is from evil, and thought 
with a purpose is of good and evil, and this is a good 4 ." 

The last sentence contains one of the two or three very 

1 Enn. m. 2, 18: olov in /moixeias /cat alxfJ-aXwrov dybyyrjs wcudes Kara <f>vcriv 
fieXriovs /cat avdpes, el rtixoi, /cat irokeis aAXat a/xeivovs tQv ireTropdrnx^vwv virb 
avdpwv irovTjpCov. From a passage like this may we not infer that Plotinus was 
able to see the barbarian inroads without despairing of the future? 

2 Enn. I. 8, 7. 

3 Enn. I. 8, 14: SX77 toLvvv /cat aadeveias ^vxv o,lria /cat /ca/ctas atria, irporepov 
apa /ca/cTj avrr] /cat -rrpQiTov natcbv. 

4 Enn. I. 8, 15: 17 yap 8pe%is ayadov, 7) 5e £/c/cAtcris /ca/coO, rj 5e vdyais /cat ij 
<pp6vrj(TLS ayadov /cat /ca/coO, /cat aih-77 ev tl twv dyadwv. 

w. 6 



82 THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM [CH. 

slight possible allusions in the whole of the Enneads to ortho- 
dox Christianity. With Christian Gnosticism Plotinus deals 
expressly in a book which Porphyry has placed at the end of 
the second Ennead 1 . A separate exposition of it may be given 
here, both because it is in some ways specially interesting, and 
because it brings together Plotinus 's theory of the physical 
order of the world and of its divine government. Any ob- 
scurity that there is in it comes from the allusive mode of 
dealing with the Gnostic theories, of which no exposition is 
given apart from the refutation. The main points of the 
speculations opposed are, however, sufficiently clear. 

After a preliminary outline of his own metaphysico-theo- 
logical doctrine, in which he dwells on the sufficiency of three 
principles in the intelligible world, as against the long series 
of "aeons" introduced by the Platonising Gnostics 2 , Plotinus 
begins by asking them to assign the cause of the " fall " (cr(f>d\- 
fjua) which they attribute to the soul of the world. When did 
this fall take place? If from eternity, the soul remains fallen. 
If the fall had a beginning, why at that particular moment and 
not earlier? Evidently, to undergo this lapse, the soul must 
have forgotten the things in the intelligible world; but if so, 
how did it create without ideas? To say that it created in 
order to be honoured is a ridiculous metaphor taken from 
statuaries on earth 3 . Then, as to its future destruction of the 
world, if it repented of its creation, what is it waiting for? If 
it has not yet repented, it is not likely to repent now that it 
has become more accustomed to that which it made, and more 
attached to it by length of time. Those who hold that, because 
there are many hardships in the world, it has therefore come 
into existence for ill, must think that it ought to be identical 
with the intelligible world, and not merely an image of it. 
Taken as what it is, there could be no fairer image. And why 
this refusal to the heavenly bodies of all participation in the 

1 Enn. n. 9. Hpos tovs naicbv tov dyfuovpybv tov koct/aov kcll tov Kocrp^ov KaKov 
elvai \eyovras, or Ilpds tovs yvucrTLKotis. 

2 Cf. Enn. n. 9, 6: rets be aWas VTroo~T&<Teis tL XPV Myeiv as elo-ayovat., 
7rapoiK7)o-ei5 /cat avTLTVirovs teal fxeravoias ; 

3 Enn. II. 9, 4: ri yap av eavrrj /cat eAoyifcro yevecrdai e/c tov Koa pLOiroirjaat ; 
yeholov yap to ha ti/uluto, /cat fieTacpepovTuv airb tQ>v ayaKp.aTOTroi.Civ t&v ivravda. 



V] OF PLOTINUS 83 

intelligible, — especially by men who complain of the disorder 
in terrestrial things? Then they introduce another soul, which 
they make to be compacted of the material elements, as if 
that was possible for a soul 1 . Not honouring this earth, they 
say that there is a " new earth " to which they are to go, made 
in the pattern of a world, — and yet they hate "the world." 
Whence this pattern if not from the creative power which 
they say has lapsed? Much in their teaching Plotinus never- 
theless acknowledges to be true. The immortality of the soul, 
the intelligible world, the first God, the doctrine that the soul 
ought to flee association with the body, the theory of its 
separation, the flight from the realm of birth to that of being, 
all these are doctrines to be found in Plato; and they do well 
in proclaiming them. On the part of Plato's disciples, there 
is no disposition to grudge them the right to declare also the 
points wherein they differ. They ought, however, to try to 
prove what they have to say of their own on its merits, putting 
their opinions with good feeling and like philosophers; not 
with contumely towards "the Greeks," and with assertions 
that they themselves are better men. As a matter of fact, 
they have only made incongruous additions to that which was 
better in the form given to it by the ancients 2 ; introducing all 
sorts of births and destructions, and finding fault with the 
universe, and blaming the soul of the whole for its communion 
with the body, and casting reproach upon the ruler of this 
whole, and identifying the Demiurgus with the Soul of the 
World 3 , and attributing the same affections to that which 
rules the whole as to particular things. 

That it is not so good for our soul to be in communion with 
the body as to be separate, others have said before; but the 
case is different with the soul of the whole, which rules the 
frame of the world unimpeded, whereas ours is fettered by 

1 Enn. n. 9, 5 : ir&s yap dv fwr/i' 7]vtlvovv e%ot i] iic tCov <XToix eiwv crvcrravis ; 

2 Enn. n. 9, 6: iirel rd ye eiptj/xiva rots iraXaiols 7repl twv votjtQv TroWcp dp.eiyoj 
Kai ireTracdevp-epcos elp-qrai kou rots p,r] e%airaTO)p.evot.s tt]v iirideovaav els dvdpdnrovs 
d-rrdr-qv padius yvoxxdrjaeTcu. 

3 Enn. n. 9, 6: k<xl els ravrbv ayovres rbv 8-qp.Lovpybv t-q ^pvxv- Both Vacherot 
and Jules Simon find this identification in the system of Plotinus himself. 
The error is corrected by Zeller, iii. 2, p. 633, n. 3. 

6—2 



84 THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM [CH. 

the body. The question wherefore the creative power made 
a world is the same as the question wherefore there is a soul 
and wherefore the Demiurgus made it. It involves the error, 
first, of supposing a beginning of that which is for ever; in 
the next place, those who put it think that the cause of the 
creation was a turning from something to something else. 
The ground of that creative action which is from eternity, is 
not really in discursive thought and contrivance, but in the 
necessity that intelligible things should not be the ultimate 
product of the power that manifests itself in them. And if 
this whole is such as to permit us while we are in it to have 
wisdom, and being here to live in accordance with things 
yonder, how does it not bear witness that it has its attach- 
ment there? 

In the distribution of riches and poverty and such things, 
the man of elevated character (6 airovhcuos) does not look for 
equality, nor does he think that the possessors of wealth and 
power have any real advantage. How if the things done and 
suffered in life are an exercise to try who will come out vic- 
torious in the struggle? Is there not a beauty in such an 
order 1 ? If you are treated with injustice, is that so great a 
matter to your immortal being? Should you be slain, you 
have your wish, since you escape from the world. Do you 
find fault with civic life? You are not compelled to take part 
in it. Yet in the State, over and above legal justice with its 
punishments, there is honour for virtue, and vice meets with 
its appropriate dishonour. In one life, no doubt the fulfilment 
is incomplete, but it is completed in the succession of lives ; 
the gods giving to each the lot that is consequent on former 
existences. Good men should try to rise to such height of 
goodness as their nature allows, but should think that others 
also have their place with God, and not dream that after God 
they themselves are alone in their goodness, and that other 
men and the whole visible world are without all part in the 
divine. It is easy, however, to persuade unintelligent men 



1 Enn. n. 9, 9 : et 8e yv/j.vdaiov etrj vikuvtw /ecu TiTrto/xevuv, irCos ov /ecu rai/TT? 
koKGjs tyei; 



V] OF PLOTINUS 85 

who have no real knowledge what goodness is, that they alone 
are good and the sons of God 1 . 

Having remarked on some of the inconsistencies in the 
mythological cosmogonies of the Gnostics, Plotinus returns 
again to the point that the causation of natural things should 
not be compared to the devices of an artist, the arts being 
posterior to nature and the world 2 . We must not blame the 
universe because all is not equally good. That is as if one 
were to call the power of growth evil because it is not per- 
ception, or the perceptive faculty because it is not reason. 
There are necessarily degrees in things. 

The practice of exorcisms and incantations by the Gnostics 
is especially attacked. They compose charms, says Plotinus, 
addressed not only to the soul of the world but to still higher 
powers, as if incorporeal things could be acted on by the 
sounds of the voice modulated according to some cunningly 
devised rules of art. Claiming as they do to have power against 
diseases, they would say rightly if, with the philosophers, they 
said that the means of keeping clear of them is temperance 
and a regular mode of life. They ascribe thenx, however, to the 
entrance of demons into the body, and profess to expel them 
by forms of words. Thus they become of great repute with the 
many, who stand in awe of magical powers ; but they will not 
persuade rational men that diseases have not their physical 
cause in "changes externally or internally initiated 3 ." If the 
demon can enter without a cause, why is the disease not 
always present? If there is a physical cause, that is sufficient 
without the demon. To say that, as soon as the cause comes 
to exist, the demonic agency, being ready, straightway takes 
up its position beside it, is ludicrous. 

Next the antinomian tendency of the Gnostic sects is 

1 Near the end of c. 9, a comparison is borrowed from Plato, Rep. iv. 426 : 
7] otei olbv r elvai dudpi (xt\ iiriffTafievip /xeTpeiv, erepoiv toloijtwv ttoWwu Xeydvrcau 
on T€Tpairr)xus i<TTiv, avrbv tclvtcl /xtj rjyeiadai rrepl clvtov; 

2 Enn. II. 9, 12: (pvciKwrepov yap irdurus, ct\\' oi>x ws at rixvai iirotet' vcrrepcu 
yap tt)s (pucreuis Kai rod ndtrfiov ai Te^i/cu. 

3 Enn. II. 9, 14: roi>s fxevToi eS (ppouovvras ovk dv ireidoiev, u>s odx ai v6<tol ras 
alrias %xov<jiv r\ /ca/xdrots fj ir\r]<Tp.ovals T) evdeiais ij (jy]^e<n /cat 6'\a>s /iera/3o\ats rj 
£%w6ev ri)i> apxyv V epdodev \a/3otf<rats. 



86 THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM [CH. 

touched upon. This way of thinking, the philosopher pro- 
ceeds, with its positive blame of providence going beyond 
even the Epicurean denial, and dishonouring all the laws of 
our mundane life, takes away temperance, and the justice 
implanted in moral habits and perfected by reason and prac- 
tice, and in general all human excellence. For those who hold 
such opinions, if their own nature is not better than their 
teaching, nothing is left but to follow pleasure and self- 
interest; nothing thought excellent here being in their view 
good, but only some object of pursuit in the future. Those 
who have no part in virtue, have nothing by which they can 
be set in motion towards the world beyond. To say, "Look 
to God," is of no use unless you teach men how to look. This 
was taught in the moral discourses of the ancients, which the 
present doctrine entirely neglects. It is virtue carried to the 
end and fixed in the soul with moral wisdom that points to 
God. Without true virtue, God is but a name 1 . 

The concluding chapters are directed against the refusal to 
recognise in sensible things any resemblance to intelligible 
beauty. How, Plotinus asks the Gnostic pessimists, can this 
world be cut off from its intelligible cause? If that cause is 
absent from the world, then it must also be absent from you ; 
for the providence that is over the parts must first be over the 
whole. What man is there who can perceive the intelligible 
harmony of music and is not moved when he hears that which 
is in sensible sounds? Or who is there that is skilled in 
geometry and numbers and does not take pleasure in seeing 
the orderly and proportionate with his eyes? And is there 
any one who, perceiving all the sensible beauty of the world, 
has no feeling of anything beyond it? Then he did not 
apprehend sensible things with his mind. Nothing can be 
really fair outside and foul within. Those who are called 
beautiful and internally are ugly, either have a false exterior 
beauty also, or their ugliness is adventitious, their nature 
being originally beautiful. For the hindrances here are many 
to arriving at the end. Since this reason of shortcoming does 
not apply to the whole visible world, which contains all, that 

1 Enn. n. 9, 15: avev 5e dperrjs aXrjdLVTJs debs \ey6/m.€P0s ovo/xd iariv. 



v] OF PLOTINUS 87 

must necessarily be beautiful. Nor does admiration of the 
beauty by which the physical universe participates in good 
tend to bind us more to the body. Rather, it gives us reasons 
for living well the life that is in the body. By taking all strokes 
from without as far as possible with equanimity, we can make 
our souls resemble, as nearly as may be, the soul of the whole 
and of the stars. It is therefore in our power, while not finding 
fault with our temporary dwelling-place, not to be too fond of 
the body, and to become pure, and to despise death, and to 
know the better and follow it, and to regard without envy 
those higher mundane souls that can and do pursue the same 
intelligible objects, and pursue them eternally 1 . 

4. Aesthetics. 

The passages devoted by Plotinus to aesthetics are not 
lengthy, but among ancient writings that touch upon the 
general theory of beauty and the psychology of art, they are 
of exceptional value. In his early book "On the Beautiful 2 ," 
where he closely follows Plato, he at the same time indicates 
more than one new point of view. A brief summary will make 
this clear. 

Beauty, he first argues, cannot depend wholly on symmetry, 
for single colours and sounds are beautiful. The same face too, 
though its symmetry remains, may seem at one time beautiful, 
at another not. And, when we go beyond sensible beauty, how 
do action and knowledge and virtue, in their different kinds, 

1 Philo also, it may be noted here, accepted the opinion attributing life and 
mind to the stars. In his optimism of course the Jewish philosopher agrees 
with Plato and Plotinus. The Gnostics seem to have taken up from the 
popular astrology the notion that the planets exercise malignant influences. 
Plotinus has some ironical remarks on the terror they express of the immense 
and fiery bodies of the spheres. Against the astrological polytheism which 
regarded the planetary gods as rulers of the world, he himself protests in a 
book where he examines sceptically and with destructive effect the claims of 
astrology. See Enn. n. 3, 6: oKcos d£ fxrjdevl hi to Kijpiov ttjs biOLK-fjcreojs 5i56vai, 
totutols 8e ra ttclvto, 8i86vat, dicnrep ovk iiriaraTovvTOS evos, acf> ov dirjpTTjadat. to 
irav eKaaTU) 5t-86vTOS /cara <f>Tj<nv to olvtov irepaiveiv /cat evepyeiv tcl avrov avvre- 
Tay/xevov av /Uer' clvtov, Xijovtos €<ttl /cat ayvoovvTos KocrfMov <fiticriv dpxw %X 0VT0S 
/cat clItLolv TrpcoTrjv iiri iravra lovaau. 

2 Enn. i. 6. Hepl tov koXov. 



88 THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM [ch. 

become beautiful by symmetry? For, though the soul in 
which they inhere has a multiplicity of parts, they cannot dis- 
play a true symmetry like that of magnitudes and numbers 1 . 

The explanation of delight in sensible beauty, so far as it 
can be explained, is that when the soul perceives something 
akin to its own nature it feels joy in it; and this it does when 
indeterminate matter is brought under a form proceeding from 
the real being of things. Thus beauty may attach itself to 
the parts of anything as well as to the whole. The external 
form is the indivisible internal form divided in appearance by 
material mass. Perception seizes the unity and presents it to 
the kindred soul. An example of this relation is that among 
the elements of body fire is especially beautiful because it is 
the formative element 2 . 

The beauty of action and knowledge and virtue, though not 
seized by sense-perception, is like sensible beauty in that it 
cannot be explained to those who have not felt it. It is itself 
in the soul. What then is it that those who love beauty of 
soul take delight in when they become aware of it either in 
others or in themselves? To know this, we must set its 
opposite, ugliness, beside beauty, and compare them. Ugli- 
ness we find in a disorderly soul, and this disorderliness we 
can only understand as superinduced by matter. If beauty 
is ever to be regained in such a soul, it must be by purification 
from the admixture. The ugliness is in fact the admixture of 
disorderly passions derived from too close association with 
the body, and it is the soul itself in its unmixed nature that 
is beautiful. All virtue is purification. Now the soul, as it 
becomes pure of regard for outward and inferior things, is 
borne upward to intellect. In intellect accordingly is the 
native and not alien beauty of the soul; because only when 
thus borne upward is it in truth soul and nothing else. Thus 
beauty is being, which is one with intellect, and the nature 
other than being is the ugly. The good and the beautiful are 
therefore to be looked for together, as are the ugly and the 

1 Enn. I. 6, 1 : otire yap ws p-eyedrj otire m apidfiol (xv^jxerpa Kairoi irXeiovwv 
fxepujv ttjs 'fivxv* ovtojv. 

2 Here the theoretical explanation is to be found in the Stoic physics. 



V] OF PLOTINUS 89 

evil. The first principle (to irpuiTov) is Beauty itself (fcaWovrj), 
as it is the Good (rayaOov). Intellect is the beautiful (to kclXov). 
Soul is beautiful through intellect. All other things are 
beautiful through the formative soul. 

A return must therefore be made again to the principle 
after which every soul aspires, to the Idea of the Good in 
itself and of Beauty in itself. This is to be reached by closing 
the eyes to common sights and arousing another power of 
vision which all have but few make use of 1 . For such vision 
you must prepare yourself first by looking upon things done 
beautifully by other souls. Thus you will be enabled to see 
the beauty of the soul itself. But to see this, you must refer 
it to your own soul. If there is any difficulty here, then your 
task must be to shape your soul into accord with ideal beauty 
as a sculptor shapes a statue. For only by such inward refer- 
ence is the beauty to be seen that belongs to souls 2 . 

At the end of this book, Plotinus suggests a distinction 
afterwards developed. If, he says, we speak broadly and with- 
out exact discrimination, then the first principle, which pro- 
jects or radiates beauty from itself, may be called beautiful. 
If we distinguish more accurately, we shall assign to the Ideas 
"intelligible beauty"; the Good which is beyond, we shall 
regard as the spring and principle of beauty 3 . Elsewhere he 
gives a psychological reason why beauty is in the second place. 
Those who apprehend the beautiful catch sight of it in a 
glimpse, and while they are as it were in a state of knowledge 
and awake. The good is always present, though unseen, — 
even to those that are asleep, — and it does not astound them 
once they see it, nor is any pain mixed with the recognition 
of it. Love of the beautiful gives pain as well as pleasure, 

1 Enn. I. 6, 8. No vehicle of land or sea is of avail, d\\o ravra iravTa 
a<f>eivai Set /cat /xrj ftXeweiv, dXX' olov fifoavTa 6\f/iv oXXtjv aXXd^aadai /cat aveyelpai, 
r\v ix €L ^ v 7r ^ s > XP&vTai 8k 6X1701. 

2 Enn. I. 6,9: to yap bpwu wpbs to bp&fievov crvyyeves /cat 6/xoiov iroiyaanevov 
Set eirifiaXXeiv rrj 6ia. ov yap av ttu}ttot€ elbev dcpdaX/ubs rjXcov yXioeiSijs yu.77 
yeyevrj/xevos, ov8e rb KaXbv av t'Sot \pvxh f^V /caXrj yevo/xevr). 

3 Enn. I. 6, 9 : uxxre 6\ocrxepet fiev Xoyy rb irpGrov KaXbv ' 8iaip(vv 5e rd vo-qra 
to jxhv votjtov KaXbu tov tQiv eidwv (prjcrei rbirov, to 8' ayadbv to eVe'/cei^a /cat irrjyTji/ 
/cat apxw tov KaXov. 



90 THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM [CH. 

because it is at once a momentary reminiscence and an as- 
piration after what cannot be retained 1 . In another place 2 , 
the higher kind of beauty that transcends the rules of art is 
declared to be a direct impress of the good beyond intelligence. 
It is this, says Plotinus, that adds to the mere symmetry of 
beauty, which may still be seen in one dead, the living grace 
that sets the soul actively in motion. By this also' the more 
lifelike statues are more beautiful even when they are less pro- 
portionate. The irregularity that comes from indeterminate 
matter is at the opposite extreme, and is ugliness. Mere size 
is never beautiful. If bulk is the matter of beauty (to fieya 
v\r) tov koXov), this means that it is that on which form is to 
be impressed. The larger anything is, the more it is in need 
of beautiful order. Without order, greater size only means 
greater ugliness 3 . 

Discussing, in a separate book 4 , Intellectual or Intelligible 
Beauty, Plotinus begins by observing that the beauty of a 
statue comes not from the matter of the unshapen stone, but 
from the form conferred by art (irapa tov ecSovs, b ivrjKev r) 
rexvT)). If any one thinks meanly of the arts because they 
imitate nature 5 , first it must be pointed out that the natures of 
the things imitated are themselves imitations of ideal being, 
which precedes them in the logical order of causation. And 
the arts do not simply imitate the thing seen, but run back to 
the rational laws whence its nature is. Besides, they create 
much from themselves (iroXka irap clvtwv irotovat), filling up 
deficiencies in the visible model. Thus Phidias did not shape 
his Zeus after anything in perception, but from his own 
apprehension of the God as he might appear if he had the 
will to manifest himself to our eyes. 

The arts themselves — which as creative ideas are in the 
soul of the artist — have a beauty surpassing that of the works 

1 Enn. V. 5, 12: /ecu eo-ri de to /xev tjttlop ical irpoarjves ./ecu afipbrepov /cat, ci>s 
£de\ei tis, irapbv airy • to 8k ddfi^os e'xei /cal ?Kir\y£iv nal avfxfiiyi] rw akyvvovTi 

TT)V 7}80V7)P. 

2 Enn. vi. 7, 22. 3 Enn. vi. 6, 1. 

4 Enn. v. 8. Ilepi tov votjtov koWovs. 

5 The argument here is no doubt, as Professor Bosanquet remarks in his 
History of Aesthetic, tacitly directed against Plato himself. 



v] OF PLOTINUS 91 

that proceed from them; these being necessarily, from the 
separateness of manifestation which takes the place of the 
original unity, weakened resemblances of the mental concep- 
tion that remains. Thus we are brought back to the thought 
that if we would recognise true beauty, whether seen in nature 
or in art, we must look within 1 . The proper abode of beauty 
is the intellectual being to which the soul attains only by 
inward vision. Above it is the good beyond knowledge, from 
which it is infused. Below it is the beauty found dispersed 
in visible things, by which the soul, if not altogether depraved 
from its original nature, is awakened to the Beauty of the 
Ideas. 

5. Ethics. 

The good which is beyond beauty is also beyond moral 
virtue, as we saw at an earlier stage of the exposition. The 
attainment of it belongs to the mystical consummation of 
Plotinus's philosophy, and not properly to its ethical any 
more than to its aesthetical part. At the same time, it is not 
regarded as attainable without previous discipline both in 
practical moral virtue and in the pursuit of intellectual wis- 
dom. The mere discipline is not sufficient by itself to assure 
the attainment of the end; but it is, to begin with, the only 
path to follow. 

In treating of virtue, on its practical side, Plotinus differs 

from his Stoical predecessors chiefly in the stress he lays on 

the interpretation even of civic virtue as a preliminary means 

of purifying the soul from admixture with body. The one 

point where he decidedly goes beyond them in the way of 

precept is his prohibition of suicide 2 except in the rarest of 

cases 3 . Here he returns in the letter of the prohibition to the 

view of earlier moralists. The philosopher must no longer say 

to his disciples, as during the period of the Stoic preaching, 

that if they are in any way dissatisfied with life "the door is 

open." A moralist under the Empire cannot, on the other 

hand, take the ground of Aristotle, that suicide is an injury 

1 Eim. v. 8, 2. 2 Enn. i. 9. 

3 Cf. Enn. I. 4, 7: d\X' ei alx/^dXcoro? ayoiro, irap toL ecrrcv 656s ei-Uvai, el ixtj 

e'irq evbaiixoveiv . 



92 THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM [CH. 

to the State. No public interest was so obviously affected 
by the loss of a single unit as to make this ground of appeal 
clearly rational. The argument Plotinus makes use of is sub- 
stantially that which Plato borrowed from the Pythagoreans. 
To take a violent mode of departing from the present life 
will not purify the soul from the passions that cling to the 
composite being, and so will not completely separate it and 
set it free from metempsychosis. Through not submitting to 
its appointed discipline, it may even have to endure a worse 
lot in its next life 1 . So long as there is a possibility of making 
progress here, it is better to remain. 

The view that in moral action the inward disposition is the 
essential thing, is to be found already, as a clearly formulated 
principle, in Aristotle. The Stoics had persistently enforced 
it; and now in Plotinus it leads to a still higher degree of 
detachment, culminating as we shall see in mysticism. Por- 
phyry made the gradation of the virtues by his master some- 
what more explicit; and Iamblichus was, as Vacherot has re- 
marked 2 , more moderate and practical in his ethical doctrine; 
but invariably the attitude of the school is one of extreme 
inwardness. Not only is the inner spring that b}^ which moral 
action is to be tested; the all-important point in relation both 
to conduct and insight is to look to the true nature of the 
soul and, keeping this in view, to rid it of its excrescences. 
First in the order of moral progress are the " political " virtues, 
which make the soul orderly in the world of mixture. After 
these come the "cathartic" virtues, which prepare it to 
ascend to the ideal world. Positive virtue is attained simply 
by the soul's turning back to the reality it finds when with 
purged sight it looks within; and it may find this reality as 
soon as the negative "purification" has been accomplished 3 . 

The perfect life of the sage is not in community but in 
detachment. If he undertakes practical activity, it must be 
from some plain obligation, and the attitude of detachment 

1 Enn. I. 9: Kal el elfiap/xevos XP^os 6 dodels eKa<TT(p, irpb tovtov ovk evrvxes, 
el /xrj, wo"irep (pa.fj.ev, av ay kcliop. 

2 Histoire Critique de VlZcole d'Alexandrie, t. ii. p. 62. 

3 Enn. i. 2, 4. 



V] OF PLOTINUS 93 

ought still to be maintained internally. Neither with Plotinus 
nor with any of his successors is there the least doubt that the 
contemplative life is in itself superior to the life of action. 
Here they are Aristotelian. The chance that the philosopher 
as such may be called on to reform practical life seems to them 
much more remote than it did to Plato. Yet, in reference to 
politics, as Zeller points out 1 , a certain predilection may be 
noticed for the "Platonic aristocracy." It may be observed 
also that Plotinus by implication condemns Asiatic monarchy 
as unjust and contrary to nature 2 . And the view is met with 
incidentally that practical wisdom is the result of deliberation 
in common; each by himself being too weak to achieve it. 
Thus, in the single resolution arrived at by the joint effort of 
all, political assemblies imitate the unity that is in the world 3 . 

That genuine freedom or self-dependence belongs properly 
to the contemplative and not to the active life Plotinus main- 
tains in one place 4 by the following argument. If virtue itself 
were given the choice whether there should be wars so that it 
might exercise courage, and injustice so that it might define 
and set in order what is just, and poverty so that it might dis- 
play liberality, or that all things should go well and it should 
be at peace, it would choose peace. A physician like Hippo- 
crates, for example, might choose, if it were within his choice, 
that no one should need his art. Before there can be practical 
virtue, there must be external objects which come from for- 
tune and are not chosen by us. What is to be referred to virtue 
itself and not to anything external, is the trained aptitude of 
intelligence and the disposition of will prior to the occasion of 
making a choice. Thus all that can be said to be primarily 
willed apart from any relation forced upon us to external 
things, is unimpeded theoretical activity of mind. 

In another book, the philosopher sets himself to defend in 
play the paradox that all outgoing activity is ultimately for 



1 iii. 2, p. 605. 2 Enn. v. 5, 3. 

3 Enn. VI. 5, 10: /nifiovuTaL d£ /ecu iKKkrjaiat. /ecu iracra vijvodos u>s els £v t<$ 
(ppovetv 16vt(i)v ''/cat x^pis eKaaros et's to eppoveiv acdev-qs, aiifx^aXKuv 5e els ev ttcLs 
iv rrj (Tvvodtp icai rrj ibs akrfdus crvvecrei to (ppovelv iytwyae kcu evpe. 

4 Enn. vi. 8, 5. 



94 THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM [CH. 

the sake of contemplation 1 . Production (TrotTjac^) and action 
(7rpa£t?) mean everywhere either an inability of contemplation 
to grasp its object adequately without going forth of itself, or a 
secondary resultant (irapaKo\ov6r]fLa) not willed but naturally 
issuing from that which remains in its own higher reality. 
Thus external action with its results, whether in the works of 
man or of nature, is an enfeebled product of contemplation. 
To those even who act, contemplation is the end; since they 
act so that they may possess a good and know that they 
possess it, and the knowledge of its possession is only in the 
soul. Practice, therefore, as it issues from theory, returns to 
it 2 . At the end of the book Plotinus, passing beyond the half- 
serious view hitherto developed, indicates that the first prin- 
ciple of all is prior even to contemplation. Here occurs the 
comparison of it to the spring of fife in the root of an immense 
tree. This produces all the manifold life of the tree without 
becoming itself manifold 3 . It is the good which has no need 
even of mind, while mind contemplates and aspires after it. 

The doubt for Plotinus is not whether the contemplative life 
is higher than the life of action, but whether it can properly 
be described as consisting in volition. Volition, he holds, is 
hardly the right term to apply to pure intellect and the life in 
accordance with it. Still less is it applicable to the One before 
intellect. Yet, as he also insists, to speak of the first principle 
as not- will and not-thought and not-knowledge would be even 
more misleading than the application to it of the positive 
terms. What is denied of the primal things is not denied in the 
sense that they are in w r ant of it, but in the sense that they 
have no need of it, since they are beyond it. On the other 
hand, when the individual nature takes upon itself, as appears, 
one addition after another, it is in truth becoming more and 



1 Erm. m. 8, 1 : iralf ovres 8ri ttjv 7rpd)Tr)i> irpiv eircx^pelv o~irov§d£eiv el Xeyoifiev 
Travra dewpias icpiecrdai kcu els reXos tovto |3\e^^e<.v,...ap , av tls dvdaxoi.ro to 
Trapddo^ov rod \6yov; 

2 Enn. m. 8, 6: dveKap.\pev ovv irdXiv 7} irpd^s et's Oewpiav. Cf. c. 8: irdpepyov 
dewpias r& irdvTa. 

3 Enn. ni. 8, 10: avrrj toIvvv ■jrape'o'x* ^ v T V V T~d<yai> farjv t<$ <pvT<$ tt\v toWtjv, 
e"fj.e(.ve 8e avri) ov ttoWt] odaa, dXX' dpxv TV* ttoAAtjs. 



v] OF PLOTINUS 95 

more deprived of reality 1 . To recover the reality that is all, 
it must dismiss the apparent additions — which, if they indeed 
affected the being that remains, would be diminutions — and 
return to itself. Of such additions are practical activities. In 
the world of mixture they are necessary, but they must be 
treated as such, not thought of as conferring something more 
upon the soul than it has in itself. Only b}' rising above them 
in self-knowledge can the soul become liberated. Otherwise, it 
remains attached to its material vehicle, and changes from 
body to body as from one sleep to another. "True waking is 
a true rising up from the body, not with a body 2 ." This can- 
not be completely attained by practical virtue, which belongs 
to the composite nature and not to the separable soul ; as the 
poet indicates in the Odyssey when he places the shade of 
Hercules in Hades but "himself among the gods." The hero 
has been thought worthy to ascend to Olympus for his noble 
deeds, but, as his virtue was practical and not theoretical, he 
has not wholly ascended, but something of him also remains 
below 3 . The man of practical virtue, as the Homeric account 
is interpreted elsewhere 4 , will retain some memory of the 
actions he performed on earth, though he will forget what is 
bad or trivial; the man of theoretic virtue, possessing now 
intuitive knowledge, will dismiss all memories whatever 5 . 
Memory, however, seems to be thought of not as actually 
perishing, but as recoverable should the soul redescend to 
relation with the material universe. 

Here Plotinus is expressing himself, after Plato, in terms 
of metempsychosis. As in the Platonic representation of the 
future life, intermissions are supposed during which the puri- 
fied soul gets temporary respite from occupation with a body. 
Plotinus, however, as we have seen, does not treat that which is 
distinctively called the Platonic "reminiscence" as more than 
a myth or a metaphor. When the soul, even here, is energising 
in accordance with pure intellect, it is not "remembering." 
Memory is of past experience, and is relative to time and its 

1 Enn. VI. 5, 12: ov yap 4k tov ovtos yjv i] irpocrd^KT] — ov8tv yap e/ceiVy irpocrdrj- 
<X€LS — d\Xa tov ixt] 6vtos. 

2 Enn. ni. 6, 6. 3 Enn. i. 1, 12. * Enn. iv. 3, 32. 6 Enn. rv. 4, 1. 



96 THE PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM [CH. 

divisions. The energy of pure intellect is not in relation to 
time, but views things in the logical order of concepts. Hence 
it is that the better soul strives to bring the many to one by 
getting rid of the indefinite multiplicity of detail: and so 
commits much to oblivion. 

Consistently with this general view, Plotinus holds that the 
happiness of the sage receives no increase by continuance of 
time 1 . We cannot make a greater sum by adding what no 
longer exists to what now is. Time can be measured by ad- 
dition of parts that are not, because time itself, the "image 
of eternity," belongs to things that become and are not. 
Happiness belongs to the life of being, and this is incom- 
mensurable with the parts of time. Is one to be supposed 
happier for remembering the pleasure of eating a dainty 
yesterday or, say, ten years ago ; or, if the question is of in- 
sight instead of pleasure, through the memory of having had 
insight last year? To remember things that went well in the 
past belongs to one who has them not in the present and, 
because now he has them not, seeks to recall those that have 
been. To the argument that time is necessary for the per- 
formance of fair deeds, the reply is, first, that it is possible to 
be happy — and not less but more so — outside the life of action. 
In the next place, happiness comes not from the actual per- 
formance of the deeds, but from the disposition with which 
they are done. The man of right disposition will find happi- 
ness in disinterested appreciation, for example, of patriotic 
deeds which he has not himself had the opportunity of per- 
forming. Hence (as the Stoics also held against Aristotle) 
length of life is not necessary for its moral perfection 2 . 

Several points of the ethics of Plotinus are brought together 
in a book giving a philosophical interpretation of the fancy 
that to each person is allotted his particular genius or 
"daemon 3 ." Plotinus's interpretation is that the daemon of 

1 Enn. I. 5. Ei ev Trapardaei XP 0V0V to evdaip.oveiv. 

2 Enn. I. 5, 10: to 8e ev reus Trpai-eo~i to evbaip.ovelv Tideadai. ev rots 2£u> ttjs 
dpeTrjs Kal ttjs ipvxv* eaTi TidevTos' 7} -yap evepyeia ttjs ipvxvs ev ry <ppovr}o~at. /cat 
ev eavTrj uol evepyrjaai. Kal tovto to evdai/Jidvws. 

3 Enn. m. 4. Hepl tov elXrjXOTOs 7]/j.ds daifiovos. 



V] OF PLOTINUS 97 

each of us is the power next above that in accordance with 
which his actual life is led. For those who live the common 
life according to sense-perception, it is reason; for those who 
live the life of reason, it is the power above that. How then, 
he asks, with reference to the "lots" in the Republic, if each 
while " there " chooses his tutelary daemon and his life " here," 
are we masters of anything in our actions? The explanation 
he suggests is, that by its mythical choice once for all "there," 
is signified the soul's will and disposition in general every- 
where 1 . Continuing in terms of the Platonic imaginations on 
the destiny of souls, he observes that since each soul, as a 
microcosm, contains within itself a representation not only of 
the whole intelligible world, but also of the soul which guides 
the visible universe 2 , it may find itself, after departure from 
the body, in the sun or one of the planets or in the sphere of 
the fixed stars, according as it has energised with the power 
related to this or that part of the whole. Those souls that 
have overpassed the "daemonic nature" are at this stage of 
their mutation outside all destiny of birth and beyond the 
limits of the visible heaven. 

1 Enn. in. 4, 5: dXX' el €K€t alpeircu rbv Baiixova /cat tov [3Lov, ttws Ztl twos 
Kvptoi ; ?) Kal i] aipeacs e/cei 7) Xeyofie'pr) rrjv ttjs ^XH* irpoaipeaiv /cat biadecriv Kad- 
6\ov /cat iravTovxpv alvLTTercu. In Enn. n. 3, 15, the "lots" are interpreted as 
meaning all the external circumstances of the soul at birth taken together. 

2 Enn. HI. 4, 6: XPV 7<*P oteadai koX Kdavov ehai iv rrj \pvxy tj/ullop ixt) ixbvov 
vorjTbv, ctXXct /cat xfrvxys ttjs koct/aov 6yu,oei5^ di&deciv. 



w. 



CHAPTER VI 

THE MYSTICISM OF PLOTINUS 

The aim of philosophic thought, for Plotinus as for Plato, is 
pure truth expressed with the utmost exactitude. And, much 
as he abounds in metaphor, he knows how to keep his intel- 
lectual conceptions clear of mixture with their imaginative 
illustration. On the interpretation of myths, whether poetic 
or philosophic, he is as explicit as intelligent readers could 
desire. After allegorising the myth of Pandora and of Pro- 
metheus, for example, he remarks that the meaning of the 
story itself may be as any one likes, but that the particular 
interpretation has been given because it makes plain the 
philosophic theory of creation and agrees with what is set 
forth 1 . Again, in interpreting the Platonic myth of Eros, he 
calls to mind that myths, if they are to be such, must separate 
in time things not temporally apart, and divide from one 
another things that are in reality together; seeing that even 
rational accounts have to resort to the same modes of separa- 
tion and division 2 . This relation between science and myth 
remained substantially the same for his successors. Some of 
them might devote greater attention to mythology, and in- 
dulge more seriously in fancies that a deep philosophic 
wisdom was embodied in it by the ancient "theologians"; 
but the theoretical distinction between truth of science and 
its clothing in imaginative form is made, if anything, sharper. 
The distinction comes to be used — as it is already to some 
extent by Plotinus — to explain the physical cosmogonies of 
early philosophers without supposing that they meant to 
teach an actual emergence of the world from some primordial 

1 Enn. IV. 3, 14: ravra jxev odv oirrj tls 5o£d£et, dXX' otl iju,<paii>ei ra rijs els tov 
KOGfiov doaeoos, Kai Trpo<rq.5ei tois Xeyo/J.e'vois. 

2 Enn. m. 5, 9: del 5e rovs /xvdovs, etirep tovto IvovTai, /cat /j.epL£eiv xP° y0L s & 
Xeyovvi, Kai diaipelv air aWrfkwv iroWa tQi> ovtojv 6/j.ov fiev ovra, rd^et 8e 77 dwd/meai 
5te<rrwra, oirov /cat oi \6yoi /cat yeuicreis t&v ayevv-qTwv ttolovcti, /cat rd dfxov ovra Kai 
avTol diaipovai, Kai 5i5d£aires us dvvavrai tQ vorjaavri 77577 avyxupovcri trwaipelv. 



VI] THE MYSTICISM OF PLOTINUS 99 

element or chaotic aggregate and its return to this. What the 
oldest philosophers had in view, according to the Neo-Plato- 
nist system of interpretation, was only to render their logical 
analysis of the world into its permanent constituents easier to 
grasp. As the Neo-Platonist doctrine itself was thought out 
wholly on the line of the philosophical tradition, its relation 
to "positive religion" is quite the opposite of subservience. 
The myths are completely plastic in the hands of the philo- 
sophers. Of their original meaning, no doubt they have a less 
keen sense than Plato, who saw the real hostility of a natural- 
istic "theogony" like that of Hesiod to his own type of 
thought ; but this only shows how dominant the philosophical 
point of view has become. Plato could not yet treat the myths 
of Greek religion so arbitrarily as would have been necessary 
for his purpose, or did not think it worth while. For the Neo- 
Platonists the poetic mythology has become like their own 
"matter," absolutely powerless to modify the essence of 
thought, but equally ready to take on an elusive reflexion of 
every idea in turn. Not in this quarter, therefore, need we 
look for any derogation from the scientific character of Neo- 
Platonic thought. 

If Plotinus accepted Hellenic religion as the basis of culture, 
the reason was because he saw in it no obstacle to the adequate 
expression of philosophic truth; which, moving freely on its 
own plane, could turn the images of mythology themselves to 
the account of metaphysics and ethics. Some members of the 
school, as we know, w T ere given to devotional practices and to 
theurgy; but in all this the master did not personalty join. 
On one occasion indeed, he seemed to his disciples to speak too 
loftily on the subject, though, as Porphyry tells us, they did 
not venture to ask his meaning. Amelius had become diligent 
in sacrificing and in attending the feasts of the gods, and 
wished to take Plotinus with him. He declined, saying, "It 
is for them to come to me, not for me to go to them 1 ." The 
explanation is no doubt to be found in the contrast between 
the common religious need for a social form of worship and 
the subjective intensity of the mystic. That this was in the 

1 Porph. V. Plot. 10: e/cetVoi/s Set irpbs e>e epxetrflctt, ovk i/nt -irpos iKeiuovs. 

7—2 



100 THE MYSTICISM [CH. 

temperament of Plotinus is evident all through the Enneads. 
His religious attitude invariably is that the soul, having duly 
prepared itself, must wait for the divinity to appear. External 
excitement is the very reverse of the method he points out : 
he insists above all on internal quietude. Porphyry also has 
something to tell us on the subject. Four times while he was 
with him, he relates, Plotinus attained the end of union with 
the God who is over all, without form, above intellect and all 
the intelligible. Porphyry himself attained this union once, in 
his sixty-eighth year 1 . The mystical " ecstasy " was not found 
by the later teachers of the school easier to attain, but more 
difficult; and the tendency became more and more to regard it 
as all but unattainable on earth. Are we to hold that it was 
the beginning of Plotinus 's whole philosophy; that a peculiar 
subjective experience was therefore the source of the Neo- 
Platonic doctrines? This will hardly seem probable after the 
account that has been given of Plotinus's reasoned system; 
and, in fact, the possibility of the experience is inferred from 
the system, not the propositions of the system from the 
experience. It is described as a culminating point, to be 
reached after long discipline; and it can only be known from 
itself, not from any description. Not being properly a kind 
of cognition, it can become the ground of no inference. Now, 
since the philosophy of Plotinus undoubtedly claims to be a 
kind of knowledge, it must have its evidence for learners in 
something that comes within the forms of thought. While he 
was personally a mystic, his theory of knowledge could not 
be mystical without contradicting the mysticism itself. 

In modern phraseology, it was a form of Rationalism. Cog- 
nition at its highest degree of certainty, as Plotinus under- 
stands it, may best be compared to Spinoza's "knowledge 
of the third kind," or "scientia intuitiva 2 ." Exactly as with 
Spinoza, the inferior degrees that lead up to it are: first, the 
"opinion" that is sufficient for practical life; second, the dis- 
cursive "reason" that thinks out one thing adequately from 
another, but does it only through a process, not grasping the 
relation at once in its totality. The difference is that Plotinus 
1 V. Plot. 23. 2 Eth. ii. Prop. 40, Schol. 2. Cf. Enn. vi. 7, 2. 



VI] OF PLOTINUS 101 

conceives the highest kind of knowledge not as mathematical 
in form but as "dialectical." By "dialectic" he means, not a 
purely formal method, a mere "organon," but a method of 
which the use, when once attained, gives along with the form 
of thought its content, which is true being 1 . Before the learner 
can reach this stage, he must be disciplined in the other 
branches of liberal science. As with Plato, dialectic is the 
crown of a philosophical education. Nor does Plotinus alto- 
gether neglect the logical topics he regards as subsidiary to 
this. At the beginning of the sixth Ennead is placed a con- 
siderable treatise 2 in which he criticises first the Stoic and 
then the Aristotelian categories, and goes on to expound a 
scheme of his own. This scheme, as Zeller remarks, has not 
the same importance for his system as those of Aristotle and 
of the Stoics for theirs. Porphyry, in his larger commentary 
on the Categories, defended Aristotle's treatment against the 
objections of Plotinus, and thenceforth the Aristotelian cate- 
gories maintained their authority in the school 3 . On the other 
hand, it must be observed that this affects only a subsidiary 
part of Plotinus's theory of knowledge. His general view re- 
garding the supremacy of dialectic as conceived by Plato, was 
also that of his successors. In subordination to this, Aristotle's 
list of the most general forms of assertion about being held 
its own against the newer scheme of Plotinus. By the 
Athenian successors of Plotinus more definitely than by him- 
self, Aristotle came to be regarded as furnishing the needful 
preliminary training for the study of Plato 4 . 

The philosophic wisdom of which dialectic is the method, 
Plotinus expressly declares 5 , cannot be achieved without first 
going through the process of learning to know by experience. 
Knowledge and virtue at lower stages can exist, though not 
in perfection, without philosophy ; but except by starting from 

1 Enn. I. 3. Hepi 8ia\eKTiKT]S. 

2 Enn. vi. 1-3. Ilepi rQ>v yevuv tov ovtos. 3 Zeller, iii. 2, pp. 523-4. 

4 The doctrine of categories elaborated by Plotinus being for the most part 
in no organic relation to his general system, it did not seem necessary to 
give a detailed exposition of it. Its abandonment by the Neo-Platonic school, 
besides, makes it historically less important. 

5 Enn. i. 3, 6. 



102 THE MYSTICISM [CH. 

these, the height of theoretic philosophy is unattainable. Even 
when that height is attained, and being is known in intuitive 
thought, there is something remaining still. The One and 
Good, which is the first principle of things, is beyond thought. 
If it is to be apprehended at all, and not simply inferred as 
the metaphysical unity on which all things necessarily depend, 
there must be some peculiar mode of apprehending it. Here 
Plotinus definitely enters upon the mystical phase of his 
doctrine. The One is to be seen with "the eyes of the soul," 
now closed to other sights. It becomes impossible, as he 
recognises, to use terms quite consistently, and he cannot 
altogether dispense with those that signify cognition ; but it is 
always to be understood that they are not used in their strict 
sense. That which apprehends the One is intellect — or the 
soul when it has become pure intellect; so that the principle 
above intelligence has sometimes to be spoken of as an "in- 
telligible," and as that which mind, when it "turns back," 
thinks before it thinks itself. For by this reflexive process — in 
the logical order of causes — mind comes to be, and its essence 
is to think. On the other hand, the One does not "think"; 
its possession of itself is too complete for the need to exist 
even of intuitive thought. Accordingly, since it can only be 
apprehended by the identification with it of that which appre- 
hends, mind, to apprehend it, must dismiss even the activity 
of thought, and become passive. At last, unexpectedly, the 
vision of the One dawns on the purified intellectual soul. The 
vision is "ineffable"; for while it can only be indicated in 
words that belong to being, its object is beyond being. All 
that can be done is to describe the process through which it 
comes to pass, and, with the help of inadequate metaphors, 
to make it recognisable by those who may also attain it 
themselves. 

Since that which is sought is one, he who would have the 
vision of it must have gone back to the principle of unity in 
himself; must have become one instead of many 1 . To see it, 
we must entrust our soul to intellect, and must quit sense and 
phantasy and opinion, and pay no regard to that which comes 
1 Enn. vi. 9, 3. 



vi] OF PLOTINUS 103 

from them to the soul. The One is an object of apprehension 
(avvecris) not by knowledge, like the other intelligibles, but 
by a presence which is more than knowledge. If we are to 
apprehend it, we must depart in no way from being one, but 
must stand away from knowledge and knowables, with their 
still remaining plurality. That which is the object of the 
vision is apart from no one, but is of all; yet so as being 
present not to be present except to those that are able and 
have prepared themselves to see it 1 . As was said of matter, 
that it must be without the qualities of all things if it is to 
receive the impressions of all, so and much more so, the soul 
must become unformed (aveiSeos) if it is to contain nothing to 
hinder its being filled and shone upon by the first nature 2 . 
The vision is not properly a vision, for the seer no longer 
distinguishes himself from that which is seen — if indeed we 
are to speak of them as two and not as one 3 — but as it were 
having become another and not himself, is one with that other 
as the centre of the soul touching the centre of all 4 . While 
here, the soul cannot retain the vision; but it can retreat to it 
in alternation with the life of knowledge and virtue which is 
the preparation for it. "And this is the life of gods and of 
godlike and happy men, a deliverance from the other things 
here, a life untroubled by the pleasures here, a flight of the 
alone to the alone." 

These are the concluding words of the Enneads in Por- 
phyry's redaction. In another book, which comes earlier but 
was written later 5 , Plotinus describes more psychologically 
the method of preparation for the vision. The process, which 
may begin at any point, even with the lowest part of the soul, 



1 Enn. VI. 9, 4: ov yap 8r) airecrTiv ov8evbs £k&vo Kal tt&vtwv Se, uxrre irapbv p.7) 
irapetvat. dXX' 77 rots 5e%e<r0cu dvvap,frois Kal irapeaKevaafxivoLS. Cf. c. 7: ou yap 
KeiTai irov iprj/mwaav avrov rd aXXa, dXX' Han rip bvva/Lievtp Qiyeiv €K€?vo irapbv, rip 
5' aBwarovvTi ov irdpearLV. 

2 Enn. VI. 9, 7 : ei fieWei fxrjdev ifxirbbiov iyKadrj/xevop ZcevOai. Trpbs irX^poiciv 
Kal 'i\\ap.\ptv ai/Trj ttjs (ptaeuiS rijs irpuTT)s. 

3 "An audacious saying," adds Plotinus. 

4 Enn. VI. 9, 10. Cf. c. 11: to 8e t'o-ws tjv ov dea/aa, dXXa aXXos rpbiros rod 
I8eiv, ^Ko-rao-LS /cat dw\(aaLS Kal iiridocns avrov Kal tyeais wpos acprjv Kal ardcns. 

5 Enn. v. 3. 



104 THE MYSTICISM [CH. 

consists in stripping off everything extraneous till the prin- 
ciple is reached. First the body is to be taken away as not 
belonging to the true nature of the self; then the soul that 
shapes the body; then sense-perception with appetites and 
emotions. What now remains is the image of pure intellect 1 . 
Even when intellect itself is reached by the soul turning to it, 
there still remains, it must be repeated, the duality and even 
plurality implied in synthetic cognition of self as mind 2 . Mind 
is self-sufficing, because it has all that it needs for self-know- 
ledge; but it needs to think itself. The principle, which gives 
mind its being and makes it self-sufficing, is beyond even this 
need; and the true end for the soul is, by the light it sees by, 
to touch and gaze upon that light. How is this to be done? 
Take away all 3 . 

All other things, as Plotinus says elsewhere, in comparison 
with the principle have no reality, and nothing that can be 
affirmed of them can be affirmed of it. It has neither shape 
nor form, and is not to be sought with mortal eyes. For those 
things which, as perceptible by sense, are thought most of all 
to be, in reality most of all are not. To think the things of 
sense to be most real is as if men sleeping away all their lives 
should put trust in what they saw in their dreams, and, if one 
were to wake them up, should distrust what they saw with 
open eyes and go off to sleep again 4 . Men have forgotten what 
even from the beginning until now they desire and aspire 
after. "For all things strive after that and aspire after it by 
necessity of nature, as if having a divination that without it 
they cannot be 5 ." 

Much as all this may resemble Oriental mysticism, it does 
not seem to have come from any direct contact with the East. 
Zeller indeed finds in the idea of a mental state beyond 
cognition a decisive break with the whole direction of classical 

1 This is related to intellect itself as the moon to the sun. Cf . Enn. v. 6, 4. 

2 Enn. V. 3, 13: Kivdvvevet yap oXws to voelv iroW&v eh avrb vvvekdovTuv 
avvaicdTjcn.s elvcu rod 6Xov, orav avrb ri eavro vorj ' 8 5ij Kvpiojs earl voelv. 

3 Enn. v. 3, 17: koX tovto to reXos TaXrjdivbv \f/vxy, €(pd\f/aadai 0wr6s eKelvov 

Kal olvtu) avrb dedaaadai, ovk aXXip (jxaH, ctW avTtp, di ov /ecu bpa wQs av odv 

tovto yevoiTo; a<peXe irdvTa. 

4 Enn. v. 5, 11. 5 Enn. v. 5, 12. 



vi] OF PLOTINUS 105 

thought, and makes Philo here the sole predecessor of Plo- 
tinus 1 . But, we may ask, whence came the notion to Philo 
himself? The combination of the most complete "imma- 
nence" in one sense with absolute transcendence of Deity in 
another, does not seem native to Jewish religion, any more 
than the asceticism for which, in the Essenes, Zeller finds it 
necessary to recur to a Greek origin. Once get rid of the pre- 
supposition that Neo-Platonism sprang from a new contact 
with Eastern theosophy, and the solution is clear. To Philo 
and to Plotinus alike, the direct suggestion for the doctrine 
of "ecstasy" came from Plato. The germinal idea that there 
is a mode of apprehension above that of perfectly sane and 
sober mind appears already in more than one Platonic dia- 
logue. During the period of almost exclusively ethical think- 
ing, between Aristotle and revived Pythagoreanism and Plato- 
nism, hints of the kind naturally found little response. After 
the revival of speculative thought, it is not surprising that 
they should have appealed to thinkers of widely different 
surroundings. The astonishing thing would have been if in 
all the study then given to Plato they had been entirely over- 
looked. That neither Philo nor Plotinus overlooked them may 
be seen from the references and quotations given by Zeller 
himself 2 . What is more, Plotinus definitely contrasts intellect 
soberly contemplating the intelligible with intellect rapt into 
enthusiasm and borne above it; and explains the Platonic 
imagery of "insanity" and "intoxication" as referring to the 
latter state. Mind is still sane while contemplating intellectual 
beauty, and is seized upon by the "divine madness" only in 
rising above beauty to its cause beyond 3 . That Plotinus de- 
rived from Plato his conception of the Good beyond being is 
generally admitted. It is equally clear that for the theory of 

1 iii. 2, pp. 448, 611. 

2 See, for Philo, iii. 2, p. 415, n. 5; for Plotinus, p. 615, n. 3. Cf. Porph. 
V. Plot. 23. 

3 Enn. VI. 7, 35: /cat rbv vovv to'lvvv [Set] rr\v fxev ?x €iV hvvap.iv eis to voeiv, rj ret 
iv avrcp /3\eVet, ttjv hi, rj tol iireKeiva avrov €ttl^o\^ tlvl /cat irapadoxy, /ca0' r)v /cat 
irpbrepov etopa jxbvov /cat bpcov iicrrepov /cat vovv ioye /cat ev ttxri' /cat Zgtlv eiceivr) fx.ev 
r\ Qko. vov e/j.<f>povos, aijTT} 8e vovs ipQv. orav [/yap] acppuv yevrjTai /J-edvadels too 
ve/crapos, Tore epwv yiverat airXiodels els evirddeiav rw tcopip. 



106 THE MYSTICISM OF PLOTINUS [VT 

its apprehension also there presented itself a Platonic point 
of view. Thus even the mystical consummation of his philo- 
sophy may be traced to a Hellenic source. 

Plato's own imagery, and in connexion with it his occasional 
mention of "bacchants" and "initiates," may of course have 
been suggested by forms of worship that were already coloured 
by contact with the East ; but this does not affect the charac- 
ter of the Neo-Platonic school as in its own age essentially 
a classical revival. It was not inhospitable to Oriental cults, 
being indeed vaguely conscious of an affinity to those that 
were associated, in the higher order of their devotees, with a 
contemplative asceticism ; and, as willingly as Plato, it found 
adumbrations of philosophic truth in religious mysteries. 
These, however, as we have seen, in no case determined the 
doctrine, w r hich was the outcome of a long intellectual tradi- 
tion worked upon by thinkers of original power. The system 
left by Plotinus was further elaborated by the best minds of 
his own period; and, during the century after his death, we 
find it making its way over all the Graeco-Roman world. 
Defeated in the practical struggle, it became, all the more, 
the accepted philosophy of the surviving Greek schools; to 
take up at last its abode at Athens with the acknowledged 
successors of Plato. These stages will be described in the 
chapters that follow. 



CHAPTER VII 

THE DIFFUSION OF NEO-PLATONISM 

1. Porphyry. 

Both for his own and for succeeding times, the name of Por- 
phyry stands out conspicuous among the disciples of Plotinus. 
Eunapius, writing towards the end of the fourth century, 
observes that Plotinus is now more in the hands of educated 
readers than Plato himself; and that, if there is any popular 
knowledge of philosophy, it consists in some acquaintance 
with his doctrines. He then proceeds to give credit for this 
to the interpretations of Porphyr}^. And thus, he says, the 
honour was distributed from the first. Universally the doc- 
trine was ascribed to Plotinus; while Porphyry gained fame 
by his clearness of exposition — "as if some Hermaic chain 
had been let down to men 1 ." He then goes on to celebrate 
Porphyry's knowledge of all liberal science (ovBev TrcuBetas 
elSos TrapaXeXoLTTOiys) ; of which we have independent evidence 
in his extant works and in the titles of those that are lost. 
Eunapius's biography seems to have been mostly compiled — 
not always with perfect accuracy — from the information given 
by Porphyry himself in his Life of Plotinus. 

Porphyry was born in 233 and died later than 301. He was 
a Tyrian by birth. His name was originally "Malchus," the 
root of which, in the Semitic languages, means "a king." At 
the suggestion of his teachers he Hellenised it first into 
"Basileus" and then into "Porphyrius" (from the colour of 
regal garments). After having studied under Longinus at 
Athens, he visited Rome, and there, as we have seen, became 
a disciple of Plotinus from the year 263. His journey to Sicily, 
with its cause, has been already mentioned. Afterwards he 

1 Eunap. Vitae (Porphyrius): 6 fxh yap TTKutZvos t<2 re rrjs if/vxv* ovpavlw xal 
re;? Xo£w kclI alviyfiardobet rCov \6yuv, (3api)S i86xei nal 8vo"r)Koos m 6 8e Hopcpvpios, 
Coatrep 'Epjuai/07 rts aeipa /cat 7rp6s avdpwirovs einvevovaa, 81a ttoikL\7)s 7rcu5eias 
iravTOL els to evyvuxrrov kolI Kadapbv e^riyyeWei'. 



108 THE DIFFUSION [CH. 

returned to Rome; and it was in Rome, according to Euna- 
pius, that he gained reputation by his expositions of Plotinus. 
Late in life he married the widow — named Marcella — of a 
friend; for the sake of bringing up her children, as we learn 
both from Eunapius and from Porphyry's letter to her which 
is extant. She was subjected to some kind of persecution by 
her neighbours, who, Jules Simon conjectures 1 , may have 
been Christians, and may have sought to detach her from 
philosophy. The letter is an exhortation to perseverance in 
philosophical principles, and is full of the characteristic ethical 
inwardness of Neo-Platonism 2 . That Porphyry engaged in 
controversy with Christianity, now on the verge of triumph, 
is well known; and with him, as with Julian, the effect is a just 
perceptible reaction of Christian modes of thought or speech. 
As theological virtues he commends "faith, truth, love, hope" ; 
adding only truth to the Christian three 3 . 

A distinctive character of his treatise against the Christians 
seems to have been its occupation with questions of historical 
criticism. Very little of it has been preserved even in fragmen- 
tary form, the set replies of apologists, as well as the treatise 
itself, being lost; but the view he took about the Book of 
Daniel is on record. According to Jerome, he maintained that 
it was written in the time of Antiochus Epiphanes ; so that the 
historical events supposed to have been predicted were really 
events that had taken place before the time of the writer. 
This, Jerome says, proves the strength of the case in favour 
of its genuinely prophetic character; for if events subsequent 
to the time of Daniel had not been very clearly prefigured, 
Porphyry would not have found it necessary to argue against 
the ascription to him of the authorship 4 . 

1 Histoire de Vficole d' ' Alexandrie, t. ii. pp. 98-9. 

2 See for example Epistola ad Marcellam, c. 9: rws ovv ovk aroirov tt)v 
TT€TreicrfjLevr)v ev <xol elvai /cat rb (rcpfop Kal to (Tu)£bjxevov /cat to ye airoWvov /cat 
<to> airoWtifievov tov t€ ttXovtov Kal ttjv wevlav tov re ira.Te'pa Kal tov avdpa /cat 
top tQv 6vto3s ayad&v Kadrjyeixbva, Kexvvevat ^pos ttjp tov v(pr}yy}Tov aKiav, <hs dij 
tov 8vTU)s v(p-qy7)Triv fj.7] ivrbs exovaav /j.r)5e irapa cravrrj iravra tov ttXovtov ; 

3 Ad Marcellarn, 24: Ttao-apa o-TOix&a p^aKio-Ta KeKparvvdu irepl deov' ttIsti.%, 
aXrjdeia, £pa>s, e\7rts. 

4 Cf. Jules Simon, Histoire de Vficole d' 'Alexandrie, t. ii. p. 181. "L'on peu 



VII] OF NEO-PLATONISM 109 

In the time of Plotimis, Porphyry recounts, there were 
members of various sects, both Christians and others, who put 
forth apocalypses such as those attributed to Zoroaster and 
Zostrianus, by which they "deceived many, themselves also 
deceived." Amelius wrote against the book of " Zostrianus " ; 
Porphyry himself against that of "Zoroaster," showing it to 
be spurious and recent and forged by the authors of the sect in 
order to give currency to the opinion that their own doctrines 
were those of the ancient Zoroaster 1 . The spirit of critical in- 
quiry thus aroused in Porphyry seems to have led him more 
and more to take the sceptical view about all claims to par- 
ticular revelations from the gods, including the "theurgic" 
manifestations to which attention was paid by some members 
of the Neo-Platonic school. It was probably at a late period 
of his life that he wrote the letter to the Egyptian priest 
Anebo, to which an unknown member of the school of Iam- 
blichus replied, under the name of " Abammon," in the famous 
book Be Mysteriis. 

One little book of Porphyry, entitled De Antro Nympharum, 
is an interesting example of the mode of interpreting poetic 
mythology current in the school. Porphyry there sets out to 
show that Homer, in his description of the Grotto of the 
Nymphs at Ithaca 2 , probably did not give an account of an 
actual cavern to be found in the island — for topographers 
make no mention of any that resembles the description — but 
deposited in allegorical form an ancient "theological wisdom " 
identical with true philosophy. If there really is such a cavern, 
then those who wrought it had the hidden meaning, which 
in that case was only transmitted by the poet. This meaning 
Porphyry educes with an ingenuity that has an attractiveness 
of its own. It must be noted, however, that the philosophers 
do not add, and do not think they are adding, anything to the 

j uger," says the historian on the preceding page, "par l'indignation meme que 
cet ouvrage excita dans l'3£glise, de l'importance et de la gravite des attaques 
qu'il contenait." 

1 Vita Plotini, 16: vbdov re Kaivtov to fii.fi\lov 7rapa8eiKvvs ireirXao-p.e'vov re 
inch tQiv tt]v aipecfiv (rvaTrjaafifruv els 86i-av rod ehai tov TrdXaiov Zupodarpov ra 
doy/xara, a avrol eiXovro irpecr(3eij€u>. 

2 Od. xiii. 102-112. 



110 THE DIFFUSION [CH. 

content or even to the authority of their doctrine. All such 
interpretations are in the interest of the old mythologists 
and no longer of the philosophers, who are not now putting 
themselves under the protection of the legends, but on the 
contrary are seeking if possible to save them. 

Of all Porphyry's writings, that which had the most far- 
reaching influence on culture was his short introduction to the 
Aristotelian Categories. Coming down to the Middle Ages in 
the Latin translation of Boethius, it sufficed, by a few words at 
the opening, to set going the whole discussion on " universals " 
with which early Scholasticism was preoccupied. This of 
course was not due to any special originality, but to its sum- 
ming up clearly and briefly the points of the rival theories 
maintained by Platonists, Peripatetics and Stoics. Porphyry's 
logical works generally were expository, and well adapted for 
use in the schools through keeping the subject clear of meta- 
physics 1 . Besides devoting much labour to commenting on 
Aristotle, he wrote a History of Philosophy, to which his 
extant Life of Pythagoras probably belonged; psychological 
works from which many passages are cited by Stobaeus ; and 
mathematical works referred to by Proclus. Among his oc- 
casional writings of a more original kind, the most extensive 
now remaining is the De Abstinentia (Uepl airoxn^ ifi^jrvx^v), 
a treatise against the eating of animal food. His expositions 
of Plotinus, already referred to, are still represented in the 
Sententiae ('A<£op/zal 77-po? ra vorjrd 2 ). 

In what is recorded of Porphyry's metaphysical doctrines, a 
tendency is found to greater elaboration of the triadic method 
of grouping, carried out still more systematically by later Neo- 
Platonism. The real importance of the writings in which he 
set forth the doctrine of his school was due, however, as his 
contemporaries recognised, to the insight with which he pene- 
trated to his master's essential thought and to his lucidity in 
expounding it. Some illustration of this may be furnished 
from the Sententiae. Then, as an example of his more personal 
work, an exposition may be given of the De Abstinentia. The 

1 Cf. Zeller, iii. 2, pp. 640-3. 

2 Prefixed to the Didot edition of Plotinus (1855). 



vn] OF NEO-PLATONISM 111 

treatise has, besides, a more general interest in the specimens 
it offers of the ethical questions raised and discussed in later 
antiquity, not in a spirit of scholastic casuistry but with a 
genuine desire for their solution in the light of reflective 
conscience. 

Preoccupation with ethics may be noticed in the Sententiae, 
which contain a more systematic classification of the virtues 
than Plotinus had explicitly given. Porphyry classifies them 
into Political, Cathartic, Theoretic and Paradigmatic. The 
virtues of the first class set the soul free from excess of 
passionate attachment to the body, and produce moderation ; 
those of the second class liberate it altogether from this 
attachment, so that it can now turn to its true good. The 
third class comprises the virtues of the soul energising intellec- 
tually; the fourth, those that are in intellect itself, to which 
the soul looks up as patterns. Our care must be chiefly about 
the virtues of the second class, seeing that they are to be 
acquired in this life. Through them is the ascent to the con- 
templative virtues of soul and to those that are their models in 
pure intellect. The condition of purification is self-knowledge 1 . 

When the soul knows itself, it knows itself as other than 
the corporeal nature to which it is bound. The error to which 
we are especially liable is ascription of the properties of body 
to incorporeal being. The body of the world is everywhere 
spatially, its parts being spread out so that they can be dis- 
criminated by the intervals between them. To God, Mind and 
Soul, local situation does not apply. One part of intelligible 
being is not here and another there. Where it is, it is as a 
whole. The union of an incorporeal nature with a body is 
altogether peculiar 2 . It is present indivisibly, and as numeri- 
cally one, to the multitude of parts, each and all. What 

1 Senientiae, 34. 

2 Sententiae, 35: oiire odv /cpacns, t) fi^ts, r} avvodos, rj irapddeais' d\\' erepos 
rpdiros. Cf. 6: ov to ttolovv els dWo ireXdaei /cat dtprj iroiei a iroiei' dXXa Kal r& 
■TreXdaec /cat a(prj tl iroiovvra, /caret avfi^e^-qKos rfj ireXdaei xpV TCU - On this Ritter 
and Preller remark (524 a), "Fa vet theurgicis hoc placitum." Here is a good 
illustration of the readiness which historians have often displayed to see 
the "theurgical" in preference to the scientific side of the Neo-Platonists. 
Whether by itself or taken along with the context, what the passage suggests 



112 THE DIFFUSION [CH. 

appears to be added — as locality or relation — in departing 
from incorporeal being, is really taken away. Not to know 
being and not to know oneself, have the same source, namely, 
an addition of what is not, constituting a diminution of being 
which is all, — and which, except in appearance, cannot be 
diminished. Recovery of yourself by knowledge is recovery 
of being which was never absent, — which is as inseparable 
from you in essence as you are from yourself 1 . 

This is of course the doctrine of Plotinus taken at its centre. 
With equal exactitude Porphyry reproduces his conception of 
being as differentiated intrinsically and not by participation 
in anything external 2 . Plurality of souls is prior to plurality 
of bodies, and is not incompatible with the continued unity 
of all souls in one. They exist without diremption, yet un- 
confused, like the many parts of knowledge in a single soul 3 . 
Time accompanies the cognitive process in soul, as eternity 
accompanies the timeless cognition of intellect. In such pro- 
cess, however, the earlier thought does not go out to give 
place to the later. It appears to have gone out, but it re- 
mains ; and what appears to have come in is from the move- 
ment of the soul returning on itself 4 . 

Thus closely does the disciple follow the master into the 
psychological subtleties 5 by which he anticipated the modern 



is a kind of Occasionalist phenomenism. All changes, even in bodies, have 
their true cause in immaterial being. Material approach or contact is not an 
efficient cause, but accompanies as its "accident" the real order of meta- 
physical causation. 

1 Sententiae, 41 : 6 8i) oisru) crov earlv avcnrocnraaTov kclt' ovaiav, <bs <rf> aavrov. 

2 Sententiae, 38: ov yap e^wdev eTrlKTVTOS, ovde eireiaobiwdys clvtov r\ erep&rrjs, 
ovde aWov /xede^ei, dXX' eavTi2 ttoWol. 

3 Sententiae, 39: diearwo-av yap, ovk diroKOirelaaL, ovde diroKepixaTiaaoai els 
eavras ttjv dXrjv ' /cat irdpeiffiv aXX^Xats, ov crvyKexv^vat, ovde cwpbv iroiovaai. tt\v 

SKyjv ' ... uicrirep ovde ai eiri.o-Triii.ai avvex^07)crav at iroXXcu ev -<pvxv A"? Ka ^ a ' L ircLcrai., 

ixla • /tat irahiv y\ d\r\ ciXXt? 7rapd iraaas. 

4 Sententiae, 44: if/vxi) &* fxera^alveL dr' aWov els dWo, iirafiei^ovaa rd 
vorjfMaTa- ovk e^io-rafievuiv t<2v irporepoov, ovde irodev SXKodev eireLai6vTU)v tu>v 
devrepuv ' dXXd ra fiev wcrwep direX'qkvde, naiirep p.ivovra ev avrrj ' rd 5' uairep 
aXKaxpdev ^Treiaiv. acpiKaro o' ovk dWaxodev, dXX' avTrjs /cat avrodev els eavT7)v 
Kivovfi-evys, Kai to op.\xa (pepotiavs els a £% et Kara fiepos. irvyy yap ZoiKev ovk 
a-rroppvTLp, dXXd kvkXi? els eavrrjv dva^Xv^ovari a ^x et - 

6 To ignore the subtleties of the school is especially misleading in the case 



VII] OF NEOPLATONISM 113 

position that, as the idea of extension is not extended, so the 
succession of thoughts does not suffice to give the thought of 
succession. After the illustration offered of his penetrating 
clearness of exposition, we may go on to a work which shows 
him in a more distinctive light. 

Plotinus, though personally an ascetic, laid no stress in his 
writings on particular ascetic practices. His precepts reduce 
themselves in effect to a general recommendation to thin down 
the material vehicle so that the soul may be borne quietly 
upon it 1 . There is no suggestion in the Enneads that the 
perfection of philosophic life requires abstinence from animal 
food. Not infrequently, however, both earlier and later, this 
abstinence was practised as a strict duty by those who traced 
their philosophic ancestry to Pythagoras. Now the Neo- 
Platonists, on the practical side, continued the movement 
of religious and moral reform represented by teachers like 
Apollonius of Tyana 2 . Thus many of them refrained on 
principle from flesh-eating. Among these was Porphyry. The 
occasion of his treatise was that Castricius Firmus, one of the 
disciples of Plotinus, having begun to practise abstinence from 
flesh, had returned to the ordinary custom. He could easily 
defend himself on theoretical grounds; for Peripatetics, Stoics 
and Epicureans had all their systematic refutation of the 
Pythagorean abstinence. To the arguments current in the 
schools, accordingly, Porphyry first sets himself to reply. 

The contention of the Stoics and Peripatetics was that the 

of a doctrine like that of "ecstasy." Jules Simon (Histoire de Vltcole d'Alex- 
andrie, t. ii. p. 156), referring to a passage of the Senteniiae (26), says that, 
for Porphyry, "ecstasy is a sleep." What Porphyry really says is that, 
while we have to speak of the existence beyond mind in terms of thought, we 
can only contemplate it in a state that is not thought; as sleep has to be 
spoken of in terms of waking life, but can only be known through sleeping. 
Ecstasy, that is to say, is compared to sleep because it also has to be appre- 
hended by its like, and because language, by which alone we can try to com- 
municate our apprehension to others, has been framed for a different realm 
of experience; not at all because it is a kind of sleep. 

1 Enn. hi. 6, 5. 

2 Eunapius, in the introduction to his Lives, says of Apollonius that he is 
not to be counted as a mere philosopher, but rather as something between the 
gods and man (ov/ceri <f>i\6<ro<po$ • dAX' y\v ti deQv re /ecu avdpwirov p.iaov). 

W. 8 



114 THE DIFFUSION [CH. 

idea of justice is applicable only to rational beings; to extend 
it beyond them to irrational beings, as those do who refuse to 
kill animals for food, is to subvert its nature and to destroy the 
possibility of that in it which is practicable. The Epicurean 
argument which Porphyry cites is founded on a conjectural 
account of the origin of laws. The primitive legislator per- 
ceived some utility, and other men, who had not perceived it 
at first, as soon as their attention was drawn willingly attached 
to its violation a social prohibition and a penalty. It is for 
reasons of utility that there are laws against homicide but not 
against the slaughter of animals. If indeed a contract could 
have been made, not only among men but also between men 
and animals, to refrain from killing one another at random, it 
would have been well that justice should be so far extended, 
for thus safety would have been promoted ; but it is impossible 
for animals that do not understand discourse to share in law. 
To the general argument Porphyry in the first book replies 
provisionally that he does not recommend this abstinence to 
all men — not for example to those who have to do with the 
mechanical arts, nor to athletes, nor to soldiers, nor to men 
of affairs — but only to those who live the life of philosophy. 
Legislators make laws not with a view to the theoretic life, but 
to a kind of average life. Thus we cannot adopt their conces- 
sions as rules for a life that is to be better than written law. 
The asceticism of the philosopher consists in a withdrawal 
from the things of ordinary life, if possible without trial of 
them. No one can dwell at once with the things of sense and 
the things of the mind 1 . The life of the body generally, and 
such matters as diet in particular, cannot safely be left un- 
regulated by reason. The more completely they are put in 
order once for all, the less attention they will occupy, and 
the freer the mind will be for its own life. The Epicureans 
have to some extent recognised this in advising abstinence 
from flesh, if not on the ground of j ustice yet as a means of 
reducing needs and so making life simpler. 

1 De Abst. i. 42. The theories of some of the Gnostics are alluded to. to 

8e oteadai Kara ttjv atadrjo'iv iradaivbuevov irpbs to?s vorjroh ivepyeiv ttoWovs ko.1 
tQu fiapfiapwv e£eTpaxn\i<rev. 



VII] OF NEO-PLATONISM 115 

From the practical side the objection was raised that to 
reject the flesh of animals as food is inconsistent with the 
custom of offering them as sacrifices to the gods. Porphyry 
replies by an unsparing attack on the custom. This fills the 
second book. An account of the origin of animal sacrifices 
is quoted from Theophrastus, who with reason, Porphyry says, 
forbids those who would be truly pious to sacrifice living 
things 1 . Offerings of fruits and corn and flowers and spices 
came earliest. The custom of sacrificing animals was not 
earlier than the use of them for food, which began, together 
with cannibalism, in a dearth of fruits. Living things then 
came to be sacrificed because men had been accustomed to 
make first offerings to the gods of all that they used 2 . Re- 
sponses of oracles and sayings from the poets are quoted to 
show that the least costly sacrifices with purity of mind are 
the most pleasing to the gods. Porphyry disclaims any in- 
tention of overthrowing established customs; but remarks 
that the laws of the actual State allow private persons to offer 
the plainest sacrifices, and such as consist of things without 
life. To make an offering to the gods of food from which we 
ourselves abstain would undoubtedly be unholy; but we are 
not required to do it. We too must sacrifice, but in accordance 
with the nature of the different powers. To the God over all, 
as a certain wise man 3 said, we must neither offer nor even 
name anything material. Our offering must be contemplation 
without even inward discourse. To all the gods, the special 
thank-offering of the philosopher will be fair thoughts re- 
garding them. Some of those who are devoted to philosophy, 
Porphyry allows, hesitate here, and make too much of ex- 
ternals. We will not quarrel with them, lest we too should be 
over-precise on such a matter, but will add contemplation, as 
our own offering, to their observance of pious tradition. 

1 DeAbst. ii. 11 : et/corws o Geo^pcurros aTrayopevei [at] dveiv to. e/x\pvx<*- tovs ti2 
ovtl ev<re(Seit' ideXovras. 

2 This is a generalised account. Here and elsewhere in the De Abstinentia 
there is much curious lore about the origin both of flesh-eating and of animal 
sacrifices. 

3 Apollonius of Tyana, as is mentioned in a note in Nauck's edition 
(Porphyrii Opuscula Selecta). 

8—2 



116 THE DIFFUSION [ch. 

He who cares about piety knows that to the gods none but 
bloodless sacrifices are to be offered. Sacrifices of another kind 
are offered only to the daemons — which name Plato applied 
without distinction to the multitude of invisible powers below 
the stars. On the subject of daemons, Porphyry then proceeds 
to give an account of the views popularly expounded by some 
of the Platonists (a rcbv UXcltoovikwv rives ehrj/jLocrlevaav 1 ). 
One of the worst injuries done by the bad among the daemons 
is to persuade us that those beings are the causes of earthly 
ills who are really the causes of quite the opposite. After this, 
they turn us to entreaties and sacrifices to the beneficent gods 
as if they were angry 2 . They inflame the desires of men with 
love of riches and power and pleasure, whence spring factions 
and wars. And, what is most terrible, they reach the point of 
persuading them that all this has been stirred up by the 
highest God. Nor are the philosophers altogether blameless. 
For some of them have not kept far enough apart from the 
ideas of the multitude, who, hearing from those that appeared 
wise things in harmony with their own opinions, were still 
further encouraged in unworthy thoughts about the gods. 

If cities must propitiate such powers, that is nothing to us 
(ovBev 7T/30? rj/jLas). For by these wealth and external and 
bodily things are thought to be goods and deprivation of 
them an evil, and they have little care about the soul. The 
same position must be taken as regards divination by the 
entrails of victims. This, it may be said, will be done away 
with if we refrain from killing and eating animals. Why not, 
then, kill men also for the purpose? It is said that better 
premonitions are to be got in that way, and many of the 
barbarians really practise this mode of divination. As a 
matter of fact, whether the victim is human or is an irrational 
animal, thus to gain knowledge of the future belongs to in- 
justice and greed 3 . 

1 De Abst. ii. 37-43. 

2 De Abst. ii. 40: Tpeirovaiv re fiera tovto eirl XirajseLas 7],uas /ecu dvcrias tG)v 
ayadoepyQv de&v us uipyiafievuf. 

3 De Abst. ii. 51: d\V uxrirep adiidas /cat TrXeove^ias 7)v to heKa /jLavreias 
dvaipelv rbv 6fxo<pv\ov , ovtu /ecu to &\oyov feov <j<p6.TTtiv /navreias '4veKa adiKOv. 



VII] OF NEO-PLATONISM 117 

Here Porphyry recounts a number of cases of human sacri- 
fice in former times, and their commutation into animal or 
symbolical sacrifices ; appealing to historical authority for the 
statement that it was not until the time of Hadrian that all 
survivals of such rites throughout the Empire were practically 
abolished 1 . Before concluding the book, he observes that even 
the unperverted ideas of the multitude make some approach 
to right opinion about the gods; and illustrates the remark by 
passages from comic poets ridiculing the notion that divine 
powers are pleased with such things as are usually offered to 
them. Then he points to the swarm of evils brought in by 
those who introduced costly sacrifices 2 . To think that the 
gods delight in this kind of expenditure must have a specially 
bad influence on the minds of youth, teaching them to neglect 
conduct ; whereas to think that they have regard above all to 
the disposition must tend to make them pious and just. The 
philosopher, in Plato's view, ought not to accommodate him- 
self to bad customs, but to try to win men to the better; if he 
cannot, let him go the right way himself, caring neither for 
dangers nor abuse from the many. And surely if Syrians and 
Hebrews and Phoenicians and Egyptians could resist even to 
the death kings that strove to make them depart from their 
national laws in the matter of food, we ought not to transgress 
the laws of nature and divine precepts for the fear of men. 

In the third book, Porphyry undertakes to show that 
animals, in so far as they have perception and memory, have 
some share in reason, and therefore are not beyond the range 
of justice. Defining uttered discourse, not according to the 
doctrine of any particular school but in the perfectly general 
sense of "a voice significant through the tongue of internal 
affections in the soul," we shall find that animals capable of 
uttering sounds have a kind of discourse among themselves. 
And before utterance, why should we not suppose the thought 

1 De Abst. ii. 56: KaraXvdijvaL 5e tcls avOpuirodvaias ax^Sbv raj irapa ira<nv 
(prjal HdWas 6 apiara ra irepl tCov tov Mid pa avvayaylov fjLvCTrjpiojv i<f>' 'A5piavou 

TOV ailTOKp&TOpOS. 

2 De Abst. ii. 60: ayvoovo~Lv de ol tx\v iroXvriXeiav eicrayayovTes els Tas dvcrias, 
oircos a/xa Tafrrrj eo~Lt.bv kolkQv elo-^yayou, 5ei<ri5ai/m.oviai', rpvfy-qv, vir6\r}\}/Lv tov 
8eK&fav dtivaadac to delov nal 0u<n'cus aKe?<rdai ttju adiKiav. 



118 THE DIFFUSION [CH. 

of the affection to have been there 1 ? Even if we pass over 
some of the stories about men that are said to have understood 
the tongues of animals, enough is recorded to show that the 
voices of birds and beasts, if intently listened to, are not 
wholly unintelligible. Voiceless animals too, such as fishes, 
come to understand the voices of men ; which they could not 
do without some mental resemblance. To the truth of 
Aristotle's assertion that animals learn much both from one 
another and from men, every trainer can bear witness. Those 
who will not see all these evidences of their intelligence take 
the part of calumniating the creatures they mean to treat 
ruthlessly 2 . Animals are subject not only to the same bodily 
diseases as men but to the same affections of the soul. Some 
have even acuter senses. That animals do indeed possess in- 
ternal reason is shown by the knowledge they display of their 
own strength and weakness and by the provisions they make 
for their life. To say that all this belongs to them " by nature " 
amounts to saying that by nature they are rational 3 . We too 
arrive at reason because it is our nature; and animals, as has 
been said, learn by being taught, as we do. They have vices 
of their own, though these are lighter than those of men; 
and the virtues of the social animals are undeniable, however 
difficult their mental processes may be for us to follow. 

Against the external teleology of Chrysippus, according to 
which all other animals were created for the use of man, 
Porphyry cites the argument of Carneades, that where there 
is a natural end for any being, the attainment of the end must 
be marked by some profit to that being, and not to some other. 
If we were to follow the teleological method of the Stoics, we 
could not well escape the admission that it is we who have 
been produced for the sake of the most destructive brutes ; for 

1 De Abst. iii. 3 : tl de oi>xl *at d Trac^ei rt, irpbrepov /cat Trplv eiireiv 6 fieWei, 
dievorjdr); 

2 De Abst. iii. 6: d\\' 6 fj.ev evyvib/jiav /cat e/c tovtojv fieradidojai avveaeus rots 
fwots, 6 Be aypdufAUv /cat dpiaTdpTjros avruv (ptpeTai cvvepyQsv avrov tt} els avra 
TrXeope^ia. /cat irus yap ovk e/xeWev KaKoXoyrjaeiv /cat StajSaXetj' a /cara/c67rretv cl>s 
\ldov TrporjpriTat ; 

3 De Abst. iii. 10: 6 de <piaeu Xiyuv afrrois irpoaetvai raCra ayvoel \eyuv on 
<pvaei earl Xcryt/cd. 



VII] OF NEOPLATONISM 119 

while they are of no use to us, they sometimes make their prey 
of men. This they do driven by hunger, whereas we in our 
sports and public games kill in wantonness 1 . Returning to the 
question about the reason of animals, Porphyry argues, after 
Plutarch, that to an animal that could not reason at all, its 
senses would be of no use towards action for ends. Inferiority 
in reasoning power is not the same as total deprivation of it. 
We do not say that we are entirely without the faculty of 
vision because the hawk has sharper sight. If normally 
animals had not reason, how could they go mad, as some do? 
Porphyry next cites from Theophrastus an argument for a 
relation of kinship not only among all men, but between men 
and all animals 2 . In the bodies and souls of both, we find the 
same principles. For our bodies consist not only of the same 
primary elements but of the same tissues — " skin, flesh, and 
the kind of humours natural to animals." Likewise the souls 
of animals resemble those of men by their desires and im- 
pulses, by their reasonings, and above all by their sense-per- 
ceptions. The difference, in the case of souls as of bodies, is 
in degree of fineness. Therefore, in abstaining from the flesh 
of animals, Porphyry concludes, we are more just in that we 
avoid harming what is of kindred nature; and, from thus 
extending justice, we shall be less prone to injure our fellow- 
men. We cannot indeed live in need of nothing, like the 
divinity; but we can at least make ourselves more like God 
by reducing our wants. Let us then imitate the "golden 
race," for which the fruits of the earth sufficed. 

1 De Abst. iii. 20. Here follow some pages adapted from Plutarch's De 
Sollertia Animalium, cc. 2-5, beginning: e| u>v 8t] kclI to /xev (povinbv /ecu d-qpiwdes 
yixwv eireppibadr) Kal to irpbs oIktov airadis, tov 5' rjfiepov to irXdo-TOv air-qp-^Xwav ol 
TrpcoToi tovto ToXpL-qaavTes . ol de Uv8ay6peioi tt\v Trpbs to. drjpia TtpaoT^Ta jxe\iT-qv 
eiroi-fjcavTo tov (pCXavdpunrov Kal (piXoiKTipfiovos. In view of modern discussions on 
teleology and evolution, a passage that occurs later may be found interesting. 
Having enumerated the devices of animals that live in the water for catching 
prey and escaping from enemies, one of the spokesmen in the dialogue argues 
that the struggle is nature's means of promoting animal intelligence. De 
Sollertia Animalium, 27 (979 a): Kal tov kijkXov tovtov nai ttjv irepioSov tous /car' 
aWrfkuv 5it6|ecri ical <pvyais yv/xvao~pi.a Kal /xeXerrju t/ <p\jo~is avrols ivaywviov 
iretro'triKe 8€lv6tt]tos Kal criWaews. 

2 De Abst. iii. 25. 



120 THE DIFFUSION [CH. 

The fourth book, which is incomplete, accumulates testi- 
monies to show that abstinence from flesh is not a mere 
eccentric precept of Pythagoras and Empedocles, but has been 
practised by primitive and uncorrupted races, by communities 
of ascetics like the Essenes, and by the Egyptian and other 
priesthoods, some of whom have abstained from all kinds of 
animal food, some from particular kinds. Then, after giving 
an account of the Brahmans and of the Buddhist monks (who 
are evidently meant by the "Zajxavaioi) on the authority of 
Bardesanes (perhaps the Gnostic), who derived his informa- 
tion from an Indian embassy to the imperial court early in the 
third century, Porphyry returns to the general ascetic argu- 
ment for abstinence. One who would philosophise ought not 
to live like the mass of mankind, but ought rather to observe 
such rules as are prescribed to priests, who take upon them- 
selves the obligation of a holier kind of life 1 . 

This is the strain in which the work breaks off, but it will 
be observed that on the whole the point of view is as much 
humanitarian as ascetic. Transmigration of human souls into 
the bodies of animals Porphyry explicitly denied. Here he 
mentions it only as a topic of ridicule used against Pythagoras. 
The stories of men who have been transformed into animals, 
he interprets as a mythical indication that the souls of animals 
have something in common with our own. The way in which 
the whole subject is discussed reveals a degree of reflectiveness 
with regard to it in the ancient schools which has scarcely been 
reached again by civilised Europe till quite modern times. 
And perhaps, for those who wish to preserve the mean, no 
more judicious solution will be found than Plutarch came 
upon incidentally in his Life of Cato the Censor; where he 
contends that, while justice in the proper sense is applicable 
only among men, irrational animals also may claim a share 
of benevolence 2 . 



1 De Abst. iv. 18. 

2 Vitae, Cato Major, 5: koatoi ttjv xP r l a " r ° T V Ta t V* duccuoaijvijs irXaTirepov 
Toirov bptofiev e7n\a/m.^dvovaav ' vbp.u \xkv yap Kai tw bLKa'up irpbs avdptbirovs fxbvov 
XpT)<y6o.L irecpTuKaixev, irpbs evepyealas 8£ ical x° L P LTa * Zvtiv 6're /cat A^xpi t<2v ahbywv 
fyuv wcrirep e/c vriyris irXovaias airoppei ttjs Tj/xepbrrjros. 



vn] OF NEO-PLATONISM 121 

2. Iamblichus. 

Iamblichus, who was regarded as the next after Porphyry 
in the Neo-Platonic succession 1 , had been his pupil at Rome. 
He was a native of Chalcis in Coele-Syria, and his own later 
activity as a teacher was in Syria. He died in the reign of 
Constantine, about 330. Eunapius describes him as socially 
accessible and genial, and as living on familiar terms with his 
numerous disciples. Though he is often described as having 
given to the Neo-Platonic school a decisive impulse in the 
direction of theurgy, the one well-authenticated anecdote on 
the subject in his biography does not lend any particular 
support to this view. A rumour had gone abroad that some- 
times during his devotions he was raised in the air and under- 
went a transfiguration. His disciples, fearing that they were 
being excluded from some secret, took occasion to ask him if 
it was so. Though not much given to laughter, he laughed 
upon this inquiry, and said that the story was prettily in- 
vented but was not true 2 . Eunapius was told this by his 
teacher Chrysanthius ; and Chrysanthius had it from Aedesius, 
who bore a part in the conversation. The biographer certainly 
goes on to relate some marvels on hearsay, but he mentions 
distinctly that none of the disciples of Iamblichus wrote them 
down. He records them, as he says himself, with a certain 
hesitation; but he did not think himself justified in omitting 
what was told him by trustworthy witnesses. 

The literary style of Iamblichus, Eunapius allows, has not 
the beauty and lucidity of Porphyry's. Not that it altogether 
fails of clearness, nor that it is grammatically incorrect; but it 
does not draw the reader on. As Plato said of Xenocrates, he 
had not sacrificed to the Hermaic Graces. An interesting 
account is given of the way in which he was stirred up to 
reflection on political topics by Alypius, an acute dialectician 
of Alexandria. A public disputation having been arranged 

1 See Julian, Or. vn. 222 b, where Plotinus, Porphyry and Iamblichus are 
mentioned in order as carrying on the tradition of Plato. 

2 Eunap. Vitae (Iamblichus): 6 fikv diraTrja-as upas ovk r\v axapts, ravra 5k 
o&x ovtojs %x €L - 



122 THE DIFFUSION [CH. 

between them, Alypius put to him a question from which he 
at first turned away with disdain. The query was: "Whether 
a rich man is necessarily either unjust or the heir of one who 
has been unjust 1 ." According to the traditional philosophic 
view that poverty and wealth, in comparison with the goods of 
the mind, are alike indifferent, the question seemed frivolous ; 
but further thought modified the impression, and Iamblichus 
became an admirer of Alypius and afterwards wrote his life. 
The composition, Eunapius thought, was not successful; and 
this he ascribes to the author's want of aptitude for political 
discussion and of real interest in it. It conveyed a sense of 
Iamblichus's admiration for Alypius, but did not succeed in 
giving the reader any clear idea as to what he had said or 
done. 

Eunapius himself was not by special training a philosopher, 
but a rhetorician. He was an adherent of the party attached 
to the old religion. Commonly, he is described as an indis- 
criminate panegyrist of all the philosophers of his party; but, 
as we see, he was not wanting in candour. While looking 
back with reverence to Iamblichus as the intellectual chief 
of the men whose doctrines he followed, he does not in the 
least understate his defects of style. And on no one does he 
lavish more praise than on his Athenian teacher in rhetoric, 
Prohaeresius, who was a Christian. Iamblichus was one of 
those who are placed higher by their own age than by later 
times. His reputation had probably reached its greatest 
height about the time of Julian, who spoke of him as not 
inferior in genius to Plato 2 . Still, he remains a considerable 

1 ' EtVe fxoL, (pLXoaocpe,' irpbs avrbv g<prj, ' 6 TrKoticios rj ddiKos rj ddiKOV KKrjpov6/j,os, 
vol 7) ov; rovTiav yap /xeaov ovdev.' 

2 Or. rv. 146 a. To save their genuineness, the letters of Julian "to 
Iamblichus the philosopher" are as a rule assumed to have been written to 
a nephew of Iamblichus, known from the correspondence of Libanius. Zeller 
(iii. 2, p. 679, n. 2) points to circumstances which show that they must have 
purported to be written to the elder Iamblichus, who died near the time when 
Julian was born (331). He therefore follows Dodwell ("A Discourse con- 
cerning the Time of Pythagoras," cited by Fabricius, Bibliotheca Graeca) in 
regarding them as spurious. Dodwell gives what seems a decisive reason for 
rejecting them, namely, that Sopater, who was executed under Constantine, 

s referred to as alive. 



VII] OF NEO-PLATONISM 123 

philosopher. He modified the doctrine of Plotinus more deeply 
than Porphyry; and the changes he made in it were taken up 
and continued when it came to be systematised by the 
Athenian school. If he does not write so well as Porphyry or 
Proclus, he succeeds in conveying his meaning. And, while 
professedly expounding the tradition of a school, and freely 
borrowing from his predecessors, he always has a distinctive 
drift of his own. 

The surviving works of Iamblichus belonged to a larger 
treatise in which the Pythagorean philosophy was regarded as 
the original source of the tradition he expounds. The whole 
treatise was entitled ^Lvvaycoyrj t5)v Hvdayopelcov hoyfidroov. 
Of the separate works, the first in order is a Life of Pythagoras. 
The second is mainly ethical in content, and is a general ex- 
hortation to the study of philosophy (A070? irpoTpeirrLKo^ eVt 
fyCkocrofyLav). The remaining three are mathematical 1 . The 
best notion of the individual tone of Iamblichus's thought 
will be given by an abstract of the second book — the Pro- 
trepticus. But first a word must be said on the kind of modi- 
fication he made in the doctrine of Plotinus. 

From the references in later writers, it is known that he 
attempted a more systematic analysis of the stages of emana- 
tion by resolving them into subordinate triads. As there are 
traces of this already in Porphyry, and as Proclus carried the 
method much further, the interest of Iamblichus here is that 
he illustrates the continuous effort of the school towards com- 
pleteness and consistency. He dwelt with special emphasis on 
the position that the causal process from higher to lower is 
logical, and not in time; and thought it not without danger to 
suppose a temporal production of the world even as a mere 
hypothesis. More explicitly than Plotinus or Porphyry, he 
insisted that no individual soul can remain permanently in 
the intelligible world any more than in Tartarus. It is the 
nature of every particular soul to descend periodically and to 

1 The genuineness of one of these (Ta deokoyotifieva ttjs apid/xyriKTis) has 
been contested. The other two bear the titles Hepl ttJs koivtjs /j.a.6 '77 fiar iktjs 
€Tri<TT'/i/j.7}s and Ilept ttjs N iKOfiaxov apidfMTjTiKTJs eiaayuyfjs. See, on the former, 
Appendix III. 



124 THE DIFFUSION [CH. 

reascend in accordance with a law of universal necessity. The 
point where he was most original was, however, his affirma- 
tion, as against Plotinus, that when the soul "descends" it 
descends wholly. The whole soul, and not merely a kind of 
effluence of it, is in relation with this world so long as it is here 
at all. There is no "pure soul" that remains exempt from 
error while the "composite nature" is at fault. If the will 
sins, how can the soul be without sin 1 ? This correction in 
what seemed Plotinus's over-exalted view was almost uni- 
versally allowed, and was definitively taken up by Proclus. 
It certainly does not bear out the notion that Iamblichus 
was a thinker who deserted all sobriety in order to turn a 
philosophic school into an association of theosophic adepts. 

The Protrepticus is in considerable part made up of excerpts 
from Plato, Aristotle, and Neo-Pythagorean writings, but it is 
at the same time consistently directed to the end of showing 
the importance of theoretical knowledge both for itself and in 
relation to practice. Contemplation is put first ; but, of all the 
school, Iamblichus dwells most on the bearing of knowledge 
upon practical utilities. At the beginning he brings out the 
point that general scientific discipline must be communicated 
before philosophy, "as the less before the greater mysteries 2 ." 
We are to regard the constancy of the stellar movements, so 
that we may be prepared to adapt ourselves to the necessary 
course of things. From scientific knowledge we are to rise to 
wisdom (cro<f)[a) as knowledge of first principles, and finally as 
theology. We need knowledge to make use of "goods," which 
without the wisdom to use them are not goods, or rather are 
evils. Things in use (ra ^ptj^ara) have reference to the body, 
and the body is to be attended to for the sake of the soul and 
its ruling powers. Each of us is the soul, and knowledge of the 
soul is knowledge of oneself. The physician as such does not 
know himself. Those who practise arts connected not with the 
body directly but with things that are for the body, are still 

1 Procl. in Tim. 341 D; ed. Diehl iii. 334 (R. P. 528). el 5e v wpoaipe™ 

a/xaprdvei, 7rws dvafxaprriTOS 77 ij/vxv ; 

2 Protrepticus, c. 2, ed. H. Pistelli, p. 10: wj irpb tQv jxeyakwv fxvo-Trjpiwu to. 
/jLiicpa Trapadoreov, /ecu irpb 4>Cko<ro<f>ias TraiSeiav. 



VII] OF NEO-PLATONISM 125 

more remote from self-knowledge, and their arts are rightly 
called mechanical. We must exercise the divinest part of the 
soul by the appropriate motions. Now to what is divine in us 
the movements of the whole are akin 1 . In the part of the soul 
that has rational discourse is the intellectual principle, which 
is the best that belongs to the soul. For the sake of this, and 
of the thoughts with which it energises, all else exists. 

While without philosophy practical life cannot be well 
regulated, the theoretic life is yet not finally for the sake of 
practice. Rather, mind itself and the divine are the ultimate 
end, the mark at once of the intellectual eye and of love. It is 
by the power of living the life of theory that we differ from 
other animals. Of reason and prudence there are in them also 
some small gleams, but they have no part in theoretic wisdom; 
whereas in accuracy of perception and vigour of impulse many 
of them surpass man. Since, however, we are discoursing with 
men and not with gods, we must mingle exhortations bearing 
on civic and practical life. Now philosophy alone, in relation 
to the other kinds of knowledge, can judge and direct. And 
philosophical knowledge is not only possible but is in one way 
more attainable than other knowledge, because it is of first 
principles, which are better known by nature and are more 
determinate. It is of the highest degree of utility, because it 
definitely makes its object the insight by which the wise man 
judges and the reason which proceeds from insight and is 
expressed in law. And that it is not inaccessible is shown by 
the eagerness with which students devote themselves to it. 
Unlike other scientific pursuits, it demands no special ap- 
pliances or conditions of time and place. 

After further elaborating this argument, Iamblichus pro- 
ceeds to infer from " common notions " that insight (cppovrjat^) 
is most to be chosen for itself, and not for the sake of other 
things. Suppose a man to have everything else and to suffer 
from a malady in the part of him that has insight, life would 
not be for him a gift to choose, for none of its other goods 



1 Protr. 5, p. 31: ry 5' iv tj/juv ddy ^vyyevtis etcrt KLvrjaeis at rod wavrbs 
diavo-rjcets /cat irepupopai. 



126 THE DIFFUSION [CH. 

would be of any use to him 1 . Insight, therefore, cannot be a 
mere means to gaining other things. The way too in which 
death is shunned proves the soul's love of knowledge; for it 
flees what it does not know, the dark and the unapparent, and 
by nature pursues what is plain to sight and knowable 2 . And 
although, as they that declare the mysteries say, our souls are 
bound to our bodies to pay the penalty of some antenatal 
offence, yet, in so far as human life has the power of sharing 
in divine and immortal intellect, man appears as a god in 
relation to the other things that are on earth. 

Iamblichus next argues on Aristotelian grounds that man 
has a natural end, and that this end is that which in the 
genetic order, fulfilling itself as this does continuously, is the 
latest to be perfected 3 . Now in human development mental 
insight is that which is last attained. This then is the final 
good of man. For we must at length stop at something that 
is good in itself. Otherwise, by viewing each thing in turn as 
a means to some extraneous end, we commit ourselves to a 
process to infinity. Yet, though insight is not properly a 
utility, but a good to be chosen for itself, it also furnishes the 
greatest utilities to human life, as may be seen from the arts. 
Just as the physician needs a knowledge of nature, so the 
lawgiver and the moralist need theoretical knowledge, though 
of another kind, if they are to regulate the social life of man. 
The relation of this knowledge to the whole of life is like that 
of sight to physical action. In itself it simply judges and 
shows, but without it we could do nothing or very little. 

Those who enjoy the pleasure of insight enjoy most the 
perfection of life in itself; an enjoyment which is to be dis- 
tinguished from incidental pleasures, received while living but 
not springing essentially from the proper activity of life. The 
difficulty of living the theoretic life here, comes from the 

1 Protr. 8, p. 45: el yap Kal irdvTa rtj ?x ot > Siecpdapfxivos 5e etr] Kal voo~Qv ry 
(ppovovvrc, oi>x aiperbs 6 /3i'os' ovSev yap oipe'Sos ovde tiZv aWwv dyadwv. 

2 Protr. 8, p. 46: Kal to tpetiyeiv 8e rbv ddvarov rovs ttoWovs ddicvvcn rrjv 
<pi\o[j.ddei.av tt}s \pvxv*- (p^yei yap a fii) yiyvdjcTKet., to cr/coraJSes Kal to imtj drfKov, 
tptiaei 5e 5tw/cet to cpavepbv Kal to yviaarbv. 

3 Protr. 9, p. 51 : reXos 8e Kara (prjcrtp tovt6 4cttlv 5 Kara ttjv yhecriv iri<pvKev 
titTTaTov einTeKeladai trepaivofx.evr}$ Trjs yevio-ecos o-vvex&s- 



VII] OF NEO-PLATONISM 127 

conditions of human nature; for now we have to be constantly 
doing things that have relation to needs. This is most of all 
the lot of those deemed happiest by the many. If, however, 
we prepare ourselves by philosophising, we may hope, having 
returned whence we came, to live in untroubled contemplation 
of divine truth. Thus Iamblichus is led from the Aristotelian 
ideal of the contemplative life to the thought of the Phaedo, 
that philosophising is a kind of dying; death being nothing 
but the separation of the soul from the body to live a life by 
itself. Our soul can never perceive truth in its purity till it is 
released. To prepare it for such knowledge, and to approach 
that knowledge as near as possible while we live, we must 
purify the soul from all that comes to it from the body, — 
from common desires and fears, care about needs, and the 
hindrances thrown in the way by external sense. The genuine 
virtues of courage, temperance and justice proceed from the 
insight reached by philosophic purification; the virtues that 
result from a balancing of pleasures and pains are a mere 
adumbration of virtue. When a distinction is drawn between 
the lot in Hades of the uninitiated and of the initiated, we 
may understand by the truly initiated ('vapOy/cocpopoi fiev 
iToXkol, Paic^ot, Be re Travpot') no other than those who have 
become purified through philosophy. Those who do not arrive 
in Hades as purified souls, quickly become subject to rebirth 
in new bodies. Therefore, since the soul is immortal, there is 
for it no escape from ills and no safety except to acquire as 
much goodness and insight as possible. 

The character of the philosopher is next set forth by an ex- 
cerpt of the celebrated passage in the Theaetetus. An account 
of the ideal philosophic education is adapted from the seventh 
book of the Republic. The Platonic view is enforced that the 
special function of philosophy is to remove from the soul the 
accretion that comes to it from birth, and to purify that 
energy of it to which the power of reason belongs 1 . The argu- 
ment of the Gorgias is then taken up, that the intemperate 
soul, which would be ever getting and spending, is like a 

1 Protr. 16, p. 83: rb yap irepiaipelv rijv yiveaiv curb tt}s ipvxns kol iKKadaipeiu 
tt]v Xoyifecrdai dvpafxdvrjv avrrjs evtpyeiav fxakiGTa avrrj irpocrqicei. 



128 THE DIFFUSION [CH. 

"leaky vessel," while orderliness in the soul resembles health 
in the body. After some further development of this topic, 
Iamblichus returns to the point that philosophy is the most 
directive of all the arts (rjyefMoviKoyTdrrj iraawv rwv T€%v(ov). 
Hence most pains ought to be spent in learning it. An art of 
dealing with words, indeed, might be learned in a short time, 
so that the disciple should be no worse than the teacher; but 
the excellence that comes from practice is only to be acquired 
by much time and diligence. The envy of men, too, attaches 
itself to rapid acquisitions of every kind; praise is more 
readily accorded to those that have taken long to acquire. 
Further, every acquirement ought to be used for a good end. 
He that aims at all virtue is best when he is useful to most 1 . 
Now that which is most useful to mankind is justice. But 
for any one to know the right distribution of things and to 
be a worker with the true law of human life, he must have 
acquired the directive knowledge that can only be given by 
philosophy. 

Iamblichus then goes on to argue that even if one were to 
arise exempt from wounds and disease and pain, and gigantic 
of stature, and adamantine of body and soul, he could in the 
long run secure his own preservation only by aiding justice. 
An evil so monstrous as tyranny arises from nothing but law- 
lessness. Some wrongly deem that men are not themselves the 
causes of their being deprived of freedom, but are forcibly 
deprived of it by the tyrant. To think that a king or tyrant 
arises from anything but lawlessness and greed is folly 2 . When 
law and justice have departed from the multitude, then, since 
human life cannot go on without them, the care of them has 
to pass over to one. The one man whom some suppose able by 
his single power to dissolve justice and the law that exists for 
the common good of all, is of flesh like the rest and not of 
adamant. It is not in his power to strip men of them against 
their will. On the contrary, he survives by restoring them 

1 Protr. 20, p. 97 : top re ad aperr}* opeyd/ievov tt)s av/j.irdar]S CKeirreov elvai, it 
tLpos av \6yov rj Zpyov apiaros dt\' toiovtos 5' ai> etrj 6 irXeiaTois u>0At/ios wp. 

2 Protr. 20, p. 103: bans yap rjyeiTai. fiavikta rj rvpappop e£ a\\ov tipos 
yiyveadai i) 41; apo/xias re Kai ir\eop€^ias, /xupds £<ttlp. 



VII] OF NEO-PLATONISM 129 

when they have failed. Lawlessness then being the cause of 
such great evils, and order being so great a good, there is no 
means of attaining happiness but to make law preside over 
one's own life. 

The Protrepticus concludes with an interpretation of thirty- 
nine Pythagorean "symbols," or short precepts which are 
taken as cryptic expressions of philosophic truths. In their 
literal meaning, Iamblichus says, they would be nonsensical; 
but, according to the "reserve" (i^efivO la) inculcated by 
Pythagoras on his disciples, not all of them were intended to 
be understood easily by those who run (tols clttXIo^ clkovovctiv 
e'£ iTnSpofifjs re ivrvy^dvovatv). Iamblichus proposes to give 
the solutions of them all, without making an exception ol 
those that fell under the Pythagorean reserve. 

The interpretations contain many points of interest. If 
the precepts were ever literal "taboos," not a trace of this 
character is retained. The last given, which was generally 
understood to command abstinence from animal food, is in- 
terpreted simply as inculcating justice with fit regard for 
what is of kindred nature and sympathetic treatment of the 
life that is like our own 1 . The absence of any reference to the 
literal meaning seems to indicate that Iamblichus did not 
follow Porphyry on this point. In interpreting the " symbols " 
relating to theology, if the whole of what he says is fairly 
considered, he seems to give them a turn against credulity; 
his last word being that that which is to be believed is that 
which is demonstrable. One of them runs, "Mistrust nothing 
marvellous about the gods, nor about the divine opinions." 
After pointing out generally the weakness of man's faculties, 
which should prevent him from judging rashly as to what is 
possible to the gods, Iamblichus goes on to explain more par- 
ticularly that by "the divine opinions" (to, 6ela Boy/jtara) are 
meant those of the Pythagorean philosophy, and that they 
are proved by cogent demonstration to be necessarily true 2 . 

1 Protr. 21, p. 125: to 5Z ' i/xxf/vx^v awexov' eirl dixcuoavvrjv irpoTpiirei /ecu 
iraaav tt)v tov avyyevovs riy^v kox tt}v ttjs 6/j.oias farjs dirodoxw KaL ^P * 'irepa 
Toiavra irXelova. 

2 Protr. 21, pp. 110-111. 

w. 9 



130 THE DIFFUSION [ch. 

The precept therefore means: Acquire mathematical know- 
ledge, so that you may understand the nature of demonstra- 
tive evidence, and then there will be no room for mistrust. 
That is also what is meant in reference to the gods 1 . The 
truth about the whole, Iamblichus says in another place, is 
concealed and hard to get hold of, but is to be sought and 
tracked out by man through philosophy, which, receiving- 
some small sparks from nature, kindles them into a flame 
and makes them more active by the sciences that proceed from 
herself 2 . Many of the sayings are interpreted as commending 
the method of philosophising from intelligible principles set- 
ting forth the nature of the stable and incorporeal reality. 
The "Italic" philosophy — which had long since come to be 
regarded as a doctrine of incorporeal being — is to be preferred 
before the Ionic 3 . The precept, not to carve the image of a god 
on a ring (' Oeov rvirov fir) iiri^Xv^e SatfTuXtw') is interpreted 
to mean, "Think of the gods as incorporeal 4 ." The model of 
method for the discovery of truth about divine things is, as 
has been said, that of mathematics. Thus the precept ' kv 
6Ba> fir) cr^tfe' is turned against the method of search by a 
series of dichotomies, and in favour of a process which leads 
directly to truth without ambiguity because each step of the 
way is demonstratively certain as soon as it is taken 5 . The 
special bearing of the Pythagorean philosophy, with its appeal 
to equality and proportion, on the virtue of justice (rrjv 
reXeioTarrjp aperrjv) is dwelt on 6 . Then, in nearing the end, 

1 This extended interpretation, with its preface about the inadequacy of 
human judgments on divine things, comes out of its proper place. The 
"symbol," which is the twenty-fifth, is also explained in due order (p. 121), 
and there the preface is omitted and the whole runs thus : To 5£ * irepl de&v 
fj.r)Sh davfxa<TTov diricrTet. firjde irepl Oeluv boyp-droiv ' irpoTpeirei. fxeTifrai ical KTaadai 
eicelva ra fJLadrjfJLaTa., 6V d ovk diriOTi)oei% ovk4tl irepl Qe&v /cat irepl deiup doy/xdriav 
eX^v ra /xa077/zara ical tcls ktn<STr\p.ov iko.% dirodeit-eis. 

2 Protr. 21, p. 116: iirel yap dir6icpv<pos (pvaei ij irepl rod iravrbs d\rfdeia t kclI 
dvadrjparos licavQs- fr)T7)Tea 8e oytiajj audpuirtp teal e^x vevT ^ a ndXiara 5td 0i\o- 
acxpias. 5id yap dXkov rivos eiriTrjdev/xaTOS oi/tojj &8vvaTov ' avrrj 5e pxKpd riva 
ivavtr/xara irapa tt}s <pv<Teo)s Xafifiavovtra ical uxxavel ecpodta^ofi^vr) fairvpel re avrd 
Kol pLeyedvuei ical ivepyearepa 5td tup irap' airrrjs fiadrj/xdrup dwepyd^eraL. 

3 Protr. 21, p. 125: irpoTip.a tt]p 'IraXt/cV (pi\ocro(pLai> tt\v t<x dcribfiara Kad' 
avrd deiopovuav ttjs 'Icdpucijs ttjs ra cw/iara irporjyov/xepus e , incrKOirovp£pr)s. 

* Protr. 21, p. 120. 5 Protr. 21, pp. 118-119. 6 Protr. 21, p. 114. 



vn] OF NEO-PLATONISM 131 

Iamblichus points out as one incitement to philosophise, that 
of all kinds of knowledge philosophy alone has no touch of 
envy or of joy in others' ill, since it shows that men are all 
akin and of like affections and subject in common to unfore- 
seen changes of fortune. Whence it promotes human sym- 
pathy and mutual love 1 . 

3. The School of Iamblichus. 

After the death of Iamblichus, his school dispersed itself 
over the whole Roman Empire 2 . His most brilliant disciple 
was Sopater, a man of ambitious temperament, who, as 
Eunapius expresses it. thought to change the purpose of 
Constantine by reason. He did in fact succeed in gaining 
a high position at Court; but in the struggle of intrigue his 
enemies at last got the better of him, and he was condemned 
by the Christian emperor to be executed, apparently on a 
charge of magic. According to Eunapius, he was accused of 
binding the winds so as to prevent the arrival of the ships on 
which Constantinople depended for its supply of corn 3 . 

Both now and for some time later, philosophers and others 
who were not even nominal adherents of Christianity could 
be employed by Christian rulers. Eustathius, another of 
Iamblichus's disciples, was sent by Constantius on an embassy 
to Persia. Themistius, who was an Aristotelian, held offices 
at a later period. The Christians themselves, long after the 
death of Julian, were still for the most part obliged to resort 
to the philosophical schools for their scientific culture 4 . The 
contest in the world, however, was now effectively decided, 
and the cause represented by the philosophers was plainly 
seen to be the losing one. Of its fortunes, and of the personali- 
ties of its adherents, we get a faithful picture from Eunapius, 
whose life of Aedesius is especially interesting for the passages 
showing the feelings with which the triumph of the Church 
was regarded. Aedesius was the successor of Iamblichus at 

1 Protr. 21, p. 123. 

2 Eunap. Vitae (Iamblichus) : aXXot fiev yap dWaxou tQv dpr)pMvuv dfiiXrjTuiv 
dteKpidrjaav et's a-rraaav ttjv 'Pufxai'icriv iiriKpareiav. 

3 Eunap. Vitae (Aedesius). 4 Zeller, iii. 2, p. 739. 

9—2 



132 THE DIFFUSION [CH. 

Pergamum in Mysia. The biographer, it may be noted, dis- 
tinctly tells us that he had no reputation for theurgy. The 
marvels he connects with his name relate to the clairvoyance 
of Sosipatra, the wife of Eustathius. Aedesius educated the 
sons of Eustathius and Sosipatra;. hence the connexion. One 
of them, Antoninus, took up his abode at the Canopic mouth 
of the Nile, whither came the youth eager for philosophical 
knowledge. To him again, as to Aedesius, no theurgical ac- 
complishments are ascribed; a possible reason in both cases, 
Eunapius suggests, being concealment on account of the 
hostility of the new rulers of the world. Those who put be- 
fore him logical problems were immediately satisfied; those 
who threw out anything about "diviner" inquiries found him 
irresponsive as a statue. He probably did not himself regard 
it as supernatural prescience when he uttered the prophecy, 
afterwards held for an oracle, that soon "a fabulous and 
formless darkness shall tyrannise over the fairest things on 
earth" (kcli tc /jLvdcb&es /cai aeiSes ckoto? rvpavvrjcrei ra eVt 
777? KaXXia-ra) 1 . The accession of Julian to the empire created 
no illusion in the most clear-sighted of the philosophers. Chry- 
santhius, one of his instructors in the Neo-Platonic philosophy, 
was pressingly invited by him to come and join him in the 
restoration of Hellenism. Deterred, the biographer says, by 
unfavourable omens, he declined. The Emperor neverthe- 
less conferred on him, in association with his wife Melite, 
the high-priesthood of Lydia 2 . This he accepted: but, fore- 
warned of the failure of Julian's attempt to revive the ancient 
worship, he altered as little as possible during his tenure of 

1 Cf . Gibbon on the " Final Destruction of Paganism," where the prediction 
is quoted in a note. (Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, ed. J. B. Bury, 
vol. iii. p. 208.) In the chapter referred to, however, Gibbon antedated the 
disappearance of pagan rites; as may be seen from the lives of philosophers 
later than Eunapius's period. With the impression made on the biographer, 
it is interesting to compare his contemporary St Jerome's description, cited 
by Grote at the end of the preface to his Plato, of the desertion of the philo- 
sophic schools. Who now, asks the Christian Father, reads Plato or Aristotle? 
" Rusticanos vero et piscatores nostros totus orbis loquitur, universus mundus 
sonat." 

2 Eunap. Vitae (Maximus). Melite was a kinswoman of Eunapius, and 
Chrysanthius became his teacher in philosophy. 



VII] OF NEO-PLATONISM 133 

office; so that there was hardly any disturbance there when 
the state of things was again reversed ; whereas elsewhere the 
upheavals and depressions were violent. This was at the time 
looked upon as an example of his unerring foresight, derived 
from the knowledge of divine things communicated by his 
Pythagorean masters 1 . It was added, that he knew how to 
make use of his gift of prevision; this, no doubt, in contrast 
with Maximus 2 . 

Maximus and Chrysanthius were fellow-pupils of Aedesius, 
and were united in their devotion to theurgy. When Julian 
was first attracted to the philosophic teachers of his time, the 
aged Aedesius had commended him to his disciples Eusebius 
and Chrysanthius, who were present, and Priscus and Maxi- 
mus, who were then absent from Pergamum. Eusebius, whose 
special interest was in logical studies, spoke with disparage- 
ment of theurgy, but Julian's curiosity was excited by what he 
heard. To satisfy it, he visited Maximus at Ephesus, at whose 
suggestion he sent for Chrysanthius also. Under Maximus and 
Chrysanthius he continued his philosophical studies. It may 
have been his interest in theurgy that led him to seek initia- 
tion, during his visit to Greece, in the Eleusinian mysteries ; 
though his argument afterwards for being initiated was merely 
compliance with ancient usage; he treats it as a matter of 
course that such ceremonies can make no difference to the 
soul's lot 3 . When he had become Emperor, he invited Maximus 
with Chrysanthius, and afterwards Priscus, to Court. Unlike 
Chrysanthius, Maximus, when he found the omens unfavour- 
able, persisted till he got favourable ones. In power, as 
Eunapius frankly acknowledges, he displayed a want of 
moderation which led to his being treated afterwards with 
great severity. He was put to death under Valens, as the 

1 Eunap. Vitae (Chrysanthius): bpav youv av tis avrbv tyrjae p.a\\ov tcl 
ecrS/jLeva r) irpoktyeiv ra p.4X\ovTa, ovtws airavTa dirjdpei kclI avve\dp.^avev, waavel 
irap&v re kcu avvlov rots deoh. 

2 lb. : idavfxdadrf yovv iirl tovtois, ws ov p.6vov deivbs ra pbiWovra irpovoeiv, 
dXXa ko.1 Tots yuuadeicri. xp?7<7a<r0ai. 

3 Or. vn. 239 BC: tovtois p.h, oh d^iws rod fivrjdrjpai j3e/3iWat, Acai ^77 
fjLvydetcnv oi deoi ras a/xoi(3as aicepaiovs <I>v\&ttov<ti, to?s 8e p.oxdypoh ovhiv €<xtl 
-tt\£ov k&v daw tQv iepwv elcrcppTfjaojTi irepL(36\(ov. 



134 THE DIFFUSION [CH. 

penalty of having been consulted regarding divinations about 
the Emperor's successor. Priscus, we learn 1 , had been from 
his youth up a person of rather ostentatious gravity and re- 
serve. He was, however, no pretender, but maintained the 
philosophic character consistently during the reign of Julian ; 
nor was he afterwards accused of any abuse of power. He 
died at the time when the Goths were ravaging Greece (396-8). 
Preserving always his grave demeanour, says Eunapius, and 
laughing at the weakness of mankind, he perished along with 
the sanctuaries of Hellas, having lived to be over ninety, 
while many cast away their lives through grief or were killed 
by the barbarians. During the events that followed Julian's 
reign (361-363), the biographer was himself a youth 2 . He was 
born probably in 346 or 347, and died later than 414. 

Of the literary activity of the school during the period from 
the death of Iamblichus to the end of the fourth century, 
there is not much to say. Many of the philosophers seem to 
have confined themselves to oral exposition. Chrysanthius 
wrote much, but none of his works have come down to us. 
We have reports of the opinions of Theodore of Asine 3 , an 
immediate disciple both of Porphyry and of Iamblichus. His 
writing seems to have taken the form chiefly of commentaries. 
Proclus had a high opinion of him and frequently cites him. 
We learn that with Plotinus he maintained the passionlessness 
and uninterrupted activity of the higher part of the soul; and 
that he defended Plato's position on the equality of the sexes. 
Dexippus, another disciple of Iamblichus, wrote, in the form of 
a dialogue with a pupil, a work on the Aristotelian Categories 
which survives 4 . The book De Mysteriis, long attributed to 
Iamblichus himself, is now considered only as illustrating the 
general direction of his school 5 . Its most distinctive feature is 
insistence on the necessity and value of ceremonial religion for 

1 Eunap. Vitae (Priscus). 

2 Eunap. Vitae (Maximus): /ecu 6 ravra ypa<pa)v ewaiSeijeTO /car' ine'ivovs roi/s 
Xpbvovs irait wv kcI eh £<priftovs apri re\wp. 

3 Zeller, iii. 2, pp. 724 fl\ 

4 Zeller, iii. 2, p. 737, n. 1. 

6 An edition of it was published at Oxford by Gale in 1678, with Latin 
version and notes and a reconstruction of Porphyry's letter to Anebo, to which 



VII] OF NEO-PLATONISM 135 

the mass of mankind, and indeed for all but an inappreciable 
minority. . It is admittedly well- written, as is also the little 
book of Sallust De Diis et Mundo 1 . This Sallust, as Zeller 2 
proved against doubts that had been raised, was certainly the 
friend of Julian known from the Emperor's Orations and 
from references in the historians; and the book may have 
been put forth with a popular aim as a defence of the old 
religious system now restored and to be justified in the light 
of philosophy. A noteworthy point in it is the apology for 
animal sacrifices. As in the De Mysteriis, the higher place of 
philosophy is saved by the position that the incorporeal gods 
are in no way affected by prayer or sacrifice or by any kind 
of ceremony, and are moved by no passions. The forms of 
traditional religion, it is nevertheless maintained, are sub- 
jectively useful to men, and its modes of speech admit of a 
rational interpretation. The book ends by affirming the posi- 
tion of the Republic, that virtue would be sufficient for 
happiness even if there were no rewards reserved for it in 
another life. 

it is a reply. The later edition by Parthey (Berlin, 1857) is based on Gale's. 
English readers will find an exact account of the sceptical queries of Porphyry, 
and of the solutions given by the author, in Maurice's Moral and Metaphysical 
Philosophy, vol. i. 

1 Edited by Orelli, with Latin version and notes, in 1821, and included in 
Mullach's Fragmenta Philosophorum Graecorum, vol. iii. (1881). 

2 iii. 2, p. 734. 



CHAPTEK VIII 
THE POLEMIC AGAINST CHRISTIANITY 

In taking up the defence of the old against the new re- 
ligious institutions of the Roman Empire, the Neo-Platonists 
were simply continuing the attitude of earlier philosophical 
culture. From the time when the new religious phenomenon 
was first consciously recognised — that is to say, from about 
the beginning of the second century — it had aroused an in- 
stinctive antagonism among men who were as far from be- 
lieving the pagan myths as the Christians themselves. The 
outlines of the apology for paganism, so far as it can be re- 
covered, remain from first to last without essential modifica- 
tion. Celsus, writing in the second century, conceives the 
problem to be that of reconciling philosophical theism with 
diversities of national worship. It may be solved, in his view, 
by supposing the supreme Deity to have allotted different 
regions to subordinate divine powers, who may either be 
called gods, as by the Greeks, or angels, as by the Jews. 
Then, to show that the Christians have no philosophical 
advantage, he points to the declarations of Greek thinkers 
that there is one supreme God, and that the Deity has no 
visible form. On the other side, he insists on the resemblances 
between Hebrew and Greek legends. Greek mythology, he 
remarks, has in common with Christianity its stories of in- 
carnations. In other religions also resurrections are spoken of. 
Such are those of Zamolxis in Scythia and of Rhampsinitus 
among the Egyptians. Among the Greeks too there are cases 
in which mortal men have been represented as raised to 
divinity. Noah's flood may have been borrowed from Deu- 
calion's, and the idea of Satan from the Greek Titanomachies. 
The more intelligent Jews and Christians are ashamed of much 
in Biblical history, and try to explain it allegorically. What 
is supposed to be distinctive of Christian ethics has been put 
better, because more temperately, by the Greek philosophers. 



VIII] THE POLEMIC AGAINST CHRISTIANITY 137 

Plato holds much the same view about the difficulty there 
is for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of heaven. He 
declares likewise that evil is never to be returned for evil. 
The reproach of idolatry against the non-Judaic religions is a 
calumny. Statues are not regarded as deities, but only as aids 
to devotion. To the highest God, as all agree, only the worship 
of the mind ought to be offered. But why should not hymns 
be addressed to beneficent visible powers like the sun, or to 
mental attributes such as Wisdom, represented by Athena? 
Piety is more complete when it has regard to all the varied 
manifestations of divinity in the world 1 . 

On their side, the Christians were quite willing to appeal to 
philosophers and poets who had had ideas of a purer religion 
than that of the multitude. All such ideas, they maintained, 
were borrowed from the Hebrew Scriptures. Philo had pre- 
viously taken that view; and Numenius, among men who 
attached themselves to the Hellenic tradition, was at least 
thought to have been ready to allow something of the same 
kind. Theodoret, early in the fifth century, is sarcastic upon 
the ignorance displayed by the pagans of his time, who are 
not aware of the fact, to be learned from their own sages, that 
the Greeks owed most of their knowledge of the sciences and 
arts to the "barbarians 2 ." As against unmodified Judaism, 
the Christians could find support for some of their own positions 
in the appeal to religious reformers like Apollonius of Tyana ; 
who, condemning blood-offerings as he did on more radical 
grounds than themselves, was yet put forward by the apolo- 
gists of paganism as a half-divine personage. So far did this 
go that Hierocles, the Proconsul of Bithynia who wrote 
against the Christians in the time of Diocletian, gave his 
ecclesiastical antagonist Eusebius occasion to treat the part 
of his book that dealt with Apollonius as the only part worth 
replying to. And Porphyry, in whom the Christians saw their 
most dangerous adversary, himself made a distinct claim to 

1 See Keim's reconstruction of the arguments of Celsus from Origen's reply 
(Celsus' Wahres Wort, 1873). 

2 See p. 89 of Neumann's prolegomena to his reconstruction of Julian's 
work against the Christians, to be spoken of later. 



138 THE POLEMIC [CH. 

what we should now call religious as distinguished from philo- 
sophical liberty in the matter of food and of sacrificing. Nor 
was any objection usually raised by the authorities to re- 
forming sects that aimed at personal holiness. The Roman 
Government even looked upon it as part of its own function 
to repress savage rites, such as human sacrifices. Whence 
then sprang the repugnance almost uniformly to be observed 
in the statesmen, philosophers and men of letters who were 
brought into contact with the new religion? For they were 
quite prepared to appreciate a monotheistic worship, and to 
welcome anything that afforded a real prospect of moral re- 
form. 

We might be tempted to find the cause in the want of 
culture among ordinary Christians. Julian, for example, who 
detested the "uneducated Cynics" of his time, can think of 
nothing worse to say of them than that they resemble the 
Christian monks (airoTaKTio-Tai) 1 . The only difference is that 
the Cynics do not make a business of gathering alms ; and per- 
haps this is only because they can find no plausible pretext. 
It is those, he adds, who have shown no capacity for rhetorical 
or philosophical culture that rush straight to the profession of 
Cynicism 2 . Yet, he goes on to admit, there is really, as the 
Cynics claimed on their own behalf, a " shorter path" to philo- 
sophic virtue than the normal one of intellectual discipline. 
The shorter path is, however, the more difficult; requiring 
greater and not less vigour of mind and firmness of will. Of 
those who took it were the elder Cynics like Diogenes. The 
true as distinguished from the false Cynic remained, in fact, 
for Julian as for Epictetus, a hero among philosophers. This 
was part of the Stoical tradition continued into Neo-Plato- 
nism. And, as we know, it was a commonplace with philo- 
sophic preachers to make light of mental accomplishments as 
compared with moral strength. Besides, the Christians had 
among them men of rhetorical training who were not without 

1 Or. vn. 224 a-€. 

2 Or. vn. 225 B : tQv prjTopiKQp oi dvcr/j.aOe'aTa.Toi kcll otfS' utt' olvtov tov jScunX^ws 
'~Ep/j.ov tt\p yk£>TT<xv €KKadap9rjvai dvpdfji.€POL, (ppepcodrjpai 8e oi8e rrpbs avrrjs rrjs 
'Adypas (tvp rip , ~Epfj.rj > ...bpfxQo'ip ivl top Kvpio~/j.6p. 



VIII] AGAINST CHRISTIANITY 139 

knowledge of philosophy. The antagonism therefore cannot 
be accounted for altogether on this line. 

The truth is that the Graeco-Roman world had a perception, 
vague at first but gradually becoming clearer, of what was to 
be meant by Christian theocracy. When Tacitus spoke of the 
"exitiabilis superstitio," he had doubtless come face to face, 
as Pro-consul of Asia, with nascent Catholicism. In the fourth 
century, the new types of the fanatical monk and the domi- 
neering ecclesiastic were definitely in the world, and we may 
see by the expressions of Eunapius the intense antipathy they 
aroused 1 . Already in the second century, Celsus, while he 
treated the Gnostic sects, with their claims to a higher " know- 
ledge," as having a perfect right to the Christian name, was 
evidently much more struck by the idea of a common creed 
which was to be humbly accepted. This was the distinctive 
idea of that which he recognises as the "great Church" among 
the Christians. It is remarkable that, in dealing with the 
claims of Christianity generally, and not with the strange 
tenets of some speculative sects, the defender of the estab- 
lished order in the Roman State treats philosophy as the true 
wisdom by which everything is to be tested, and reproaches 
the revolutionary innovators on the ground that they say to 
their dupes, "Do not examine." Celsus was probably a 
Roman official; and he may have seen already some of the 
political aims of the new society. For of course the word 
"catholic" as applied to the Church was not intended to 
remain without a very tangible meaning. The Christian apolo- 
gists of the second century are already looking forward to 
spiritual control over the public force of the Empire 2 . A verse 
of the New Testament by which the claim was held to be made 
is pointed to by Julian in arguing that the Christians are not 
legitimate successors of the Israelites. Christ, according to 
the view of the Church, was the prophet that Moses foretold, 

1 Eunap. Vitae (Aedesius): eZra iireLcrijyov to?$ iepdis t6ttois robs Ka\ovp,evovs 
fAOvaxofc, avdp&TTOVS p.kv Kara to etSos, 6 5£ jSi'os avrois avd)5r)S,...Tvpavvucr)u yap 
elx*v il-ovaiav totc 7ras &j>dpa>Tros fxfKaivav <f>opG>v eadijra /ecu drjfxocria j3ov\6p.evos 
acxTjixovetv. 

2 See Renan, Marc-Aurele. The alternative imposed by the Church on the 
Empire was, Renan says, to persecute or to become a theocracy. 



140 THE POLEMIC [CH. 

of whom it was said, "that every soul, which will not hear 
that prophet, shall be destroyed from among the people" 
(Acts iii. 23). The Church possessed the teachings of Christ, 
and was a living body with the right to declare them authori- 
tatively. The true religion was not now, as under an earlier 
dispensation, for one chosen race, but for the whole world. 
Hence the whole world was bound to hear and to obey it. 
The reply of Julian was that the application of the prediction 
supposed to have been made was false. Moses never had the 
least idea that his legislation was to be abrogated, but in- 
tended it for all time. The prophet he meant was simply a 
prophet that should renew his own teaching of the law. The 
law was for the Jews only, and the Christians had no claim to 
represent them. The Jewish religion had its proper place as 
one national religion among others. It was open even to those 
who were not born under it to adopt it as their own if they 
chose; but they should have submitted to all its obligations. 
The care of the Jews about religious observances, and their 
readiness to face persecution on behalf of them, are contrasted 
by the Emperor in one place with the laxity and indifference 
of the Greeks. They are in part pious, he says, worshipping as 
they do the God who rules the visible world, whom we also 
serve under other names. In this only are they in error, that 
they arrogate to themselves alone the worship of the one true 
God, and think that to us, "the nations," have been assigned 
none but gods whom they themselves do not deign to regard 
at all 1 . 

Julian, we see, had no hostility to Hebrew religion as such. 
On the contrary, he agrees with Porphyry in showing special 
friendliness to it in so far as its monotheism may be taken to 
coincide with that of philosophy. The problem presented to 
the Empire by Judaism, so difficult at an earlier period, had 
now become manageable through the ending of all political 
aspirations on the part of the Jewish community. The ques- 
tion as to the respective merits of Hebrew and Greek religion, 
if no new question had arisen, would soon have been reduced 

1 Ep. 63 (ed. Hertlein). dXa^oveia pa.p(3apu<7J, adds Julian, irpbs ravrrjvi ttjv 
airbvoLav eirapdivres. 



VIII] AGAINST CHRISTIANITY 141 

to a topic of the schools. The system, at once philosophical 
and political, of the classical world in its dealings with religion, 
was not of course "religious liberty" in its modern sense. In 
a congeries of local worships, mostly without definite creeds, 
the question of toleration for dissentients had scarcely arisen. 
The position reached by the representatives of ancient thought, 
and allowed in practice, was that the national religions might 
all be preserved, not only as useful, but as adumbrations of 
divine truth. To express that truth adequately is the business 
of philosophy and not of popular religion. Philosophy is to be 
perfectly free. This is laid down explicitly by Julian 1 . Thus, 
according to the system, philosophy is cosmopolitan and is an 
unfettered inquiry into truth. Religion is local and is bound 
to the performance of customary rites. Those who are in quest 
of a deeper knowledge will not think of changing their ances- 
tral religion, but will turn to some philosophical teacher. At 
the same time, the religions are to be moralised 2 . Priests are 
to be men of exemplary life, and are to be treated with high 
respect. The harmony of the whole system had of course been 
broken through by Christianity, which, after the period of 
attempted repression by force, had now been for more than a 
generation the religion of the Empire. Julian's solution of the 
problem, renewed by his reversal of the policy of his uncle, 
was to grant a formal toleration to all 3 . Both sides are for- 
bidden to use violence, which is entirely out of place where 
opinions are concerned 4 . Nevertheless, for dignities, "the 

1 Or. v. 170 bc. For those of ordinary capacity (rots Idiibrais) the utility of 
divine myths is sufficiently conveyed through symbols without rational under- 
standing. For those of exceptional intelligence (tols irepiTrois) there can be 
no utility without investigation into truth of reason, continued to the end, 
ovk aldoX /cat 7rt<rret fxaXkov dWoTpias 86i-T)$ rj ry acper^pa /caret vovv ivepyeia. 

2 See Ep. 49. The progress of Hellenism is not sufficient without moral 
reform. The example set by the Christians of philanthropy to strangers, and 
by the Jews of supporting their own poor, ought to be followed by the Greeks. 
Anciently, continues Julian, this belonged to the Hellenic tradition, as is 
shown by the words of Eumaeus in the Odyssey (xiv. 56). 

3 The earliest edicts of Constantine had simply proclaimed a toleration of 
Christianity; but these, it was well understood, were a mere preliminary to 
its acceptance as the State religion. Julian stripped the Church of the 
privileges, over and above toleration, which it had acquired in the meantime. 

4 Ep. 52, 438 B: \6y(p 5e irddeadcu XPV Kac 5t§dcr/cea-0ai rods avdpibirovs, oO 



142 THE POLEMIC [CH. 

pious" — that is to say, the adherents of the old religions — 
are to be preferred 1 . Christians are not allowed to be public 
teachers of Grecian letters ; the reason assigned being that the 
Greek poets, historians and orators treat the gods with honour, 
whereas the Christians speak dishonourably of them. It is un- 
worthy of an educated or of a good man to teach one thing 
and to think another. Let them either change their views 
about the theology of the Greeks or confine themselves to the 
exposition of their own 2 . 

By this policy there is no reason to think that the Emperor 
was putting back a process by which captive Greece might 
again have led the conqueror captive. The Church absolutely 
needed the elements of culture if it was to rule the world ; and 
it could find them only in the classical tradition. It was now 
in more or less conscious possession of its own system, which 
was precisely the antithesis of the system which Julian desired 
to restore. A religion had been revealed which claimed to be 
true for all. Philosophy, so far as it was serviceable, could be 
treated as a preparation for it or as an instrument in defining 
its doctrines, but could have no independent standing-ground. 
Letters, in the hands of ecclesiastics, could furnish the gram- 
matical and rhetorical training without which the reign of a 
"spiritual power" would have been impossible. The new 
system, however, was as yet far from being fully at work. 
Christian pupils, we must remember, continued to frequent 
the pagan schools much later. Thus there was evidently no 
insuperable prejudice by which they would have been univer- 
sally excluded from a liberal education not subjugated to ec- 
clesiastical authority. If then by any possibility the advance 
of the theocratic idea could have been checked, it is clear that 
the Emperor took exactly the right measures. The classical 
authors were to be seen, so far as public authority could secure 
it, under the light of the tradition to which they themselves 



Tr\r)ya?s ovde vfipeacv ovSe alKiafja^ rod (rLofMaros. aZdis 8k /ecu ttoW&kis trapatvC} 
reus eirl tt]v a\r}Brj deoaefieiav bpfAWfAevo is fM7]8eu aSiKeiv tQi> TaKiXaioiv ra irXrjdrj, 
/j.7]8e eiriTidecrdai fMTjde vfUpifav eis avrovs. 

1 Ep. 7, 376 C: irpoTi/xaadai. fievroi to<us deoaefieis /ecu ttolvv (prj/xl Seiv. 

2 Ep. 42. 



VIII] AGAINST CHBISTIANITY 143 

belonged. Pupils were not to be systematically taught in the 
schools of the Empire that the pagan gods were "evil demons," 
and that the heroes and sages of antiquity were among the 
damned. And, hopeless as the defeated party henceforth was 
of a change of fortune, Julian's memory furnished a rallying- 
point for those who now devoted themselves to the preserva- 
tion of the older culture interpreted by itself. Marinus, in 
writing the biography of Proclus, dates his death "in the 
124th year from the reign of Julian." Thus the actual effect 
of his resistance to that system of ecclesiastical rule which 
afterwards, to those who again knew the civic type of life, 
appeared as a "Kingdom of Darkness," may have been to 
prolong the evening twilight. 

All who have studied the career of Julian recognise that his 
great aim was to preserve "Hellenism," by which he meant 
Hellenic civilisation. Of this the ancient religion was for him 
the symbol. The myths about the gods are not to be taken 
literally. The marriage of Hyperion and Thea, for example, is 
a poetic fable 1 . What the poets say, along with the divine 
element in it, has also much that is human 2 . Pure truth, 
unmixed with fable, is to be found in the philosophers, and 
especially in Plato 3 . On the Jewish religion, the Emperor's 
position sometimes appears ambiguous. He easily finds, in the 
Old Testament, passages from which to argue that the God of 
Israel is simply a tribal god like those of the nations. His 
serious opinion, however, seems to have been that the Hebrew 
prophets had arrived at an expression, less pure indeed than 
that of the Greek philosophers, but quite real, of the unity of 

1 Or. IV. 136 C: fii] dt <TvvSva<rnbv fj.r)5k ydfiovs viro\a/j.pavufj.ep, S.irio'Ta /cat 
7rapd5o£a rrjs TOiT)TtKT]s /J.o6<xrjs advpfiara. 

2 lb. 137 C : dWtt ra [xkv t&v ttoltjtCjv xa^eii' idcufieu ' £x eL 7<*P perd rod deiov 
irokv Kal to dvdpunrivov. 

3 Julian, however, like the Neo-Platonists generally, is unwilling to allow 
that Plato could ever have intended to treat the poetic legends with dis- 
respect. In Or. vn. 237 bc, he cites as an example of euXdfieia irepl ra. twv dewv 
oudfiara, the well-known passage in the Timaeus, 40 d, about the gods that 
have left descendants among us, whom we cannot refuse to believe when they 
tell us of their own ancestors. This, he says, might have been ironical (as 
evidently many took it to be) if put in the mouth of Socrates; but Timaeus, 
to whom it is actually assigned, had no reputation for irony. 



144 THE POLEMIC [CH. 

divine government 1 . In one passage — than which no better 
could be found to illustrate the antithesis between "Hebra- 
ism" and "Hellenism" — he compares them to men seeing a 
great light as through a mist, and unable to describe what 
they see except by imagery drawn from the destructive force 
of fire 2 . While himself regarding the divinity as invisible and 
incorporeal, he treats as prejudice their denunciations of the 
making of statues. The kind of truth he would recognise in 
popular polytheism he finds not altogether inconsistent with 
the Hebrew Scriptures, which speak of the angels of nations. 
National deities, whether to be called angels or gods, are inter- 
preted as a kind of genius of each race. The various natural 
aptitudes of peoples suppose a variety in the divine cause, and 
this can be expressed as a distribution made by the supreme 
God to subordinate powers 3 . That is the position taken up by 
Julian in his book against the Christians — which is at the 
same time a defence of Hellenism. From the fragments con- 
tained in Cyril's reply — of which perhaps half survives — it has 
been beautifully reconstructed by C. J. Neumann 4 . A sum- 
mary of the general argument will serve better than anything 
else to make clear the spiritual difference that separated from 
their Christian contemporaries the men who had received their 
bent in the philosophic schools. 

Evidently neither Julian's work nor any other was felt to 
be so peculiarly damaging as Porphyry's. By a decree of the 
Council of Ephesus (431) and by a law of Theodosius II. (448), 
Porphyry's books, though not those of Celsus, Hierocles or 
Julian, were sentenced to be burned. In the changed form of 
the law in Justinian's code, the books written by any one else 
to the same purpose (/card ttjs evcrefiovs rwv 'Kpianavcdv 

1 Cf. Ep. 25. 

2 FragmentumEpistolae,296A: otov <p<2s p-eya'di' bp-ix^ys ol dvOpwrrot. ^Xiirovres 
ov KadapQs ovde elXiicpivQs, avrb 5e iiceZvo vevop-iKores oi>xi 0&s icadapbv, aXKa irvp, 
kclI t&v irepl avrb iravruv oVres adtaroi fioGxri p.eya ' ^pirrere, 0Oj8etcr0e, irvp, 0X6£, 
ddvaros, (Aaxcupa, bop.cpa.ia., iroXXoh 6vbp.ao~i pdav ei-r)yovp.€J>oi tt\v (3\a.7rTUC7]i> rov 
irvpbs hvvap.iv. 

3 This idea, which we meet with also in Celsus, appears to have been 
suggested by a passage in the Critias, where such a distribution is described. 
Ci. Procl. in Remp., ed. Kroll, i. 17. 

4 Iuliani Imperatoris Librorum contra Christianos quae super sunt (1880). 



VIII] AGAINST CHRISTIANITY 145 

Oprjaiceias) are brought under the decree, but not by name 1 . 
The difference between Julian's line of attack and Porphyry's, 
so far as it can be made out, is that Julian, while much that 
he too says has an interest from its bearing on questions of 
Biblical criticism, pays no special attention to the analysis of 
documents. He takes for granted the traditional ascriptions 
of the Canonical books, and uniformly quotes the Septuagint. 
Porphyry is said to have known the Hebrew original. We 
have already met with his view on the Book of Daniel ; and so 
characteristic was his inquiry into questions of authorship and 
chronology, that Neumann is inclined to refer to him an asser- 
tion of the late and non-Mosaic origin of the Pentateuch, 
quoted by Macarius Magnes about the end of the fourth cen- 
tury from an unknown philosopher 2 . What line was taken 
either by Julian or by Porphyry on the primitive teaching of 
Christianity itself, hardly anything remains to show. Of 
Porphyry, as was said, all the express refutations have dis- 
appeared; and of the later books of Cyril's reply to Julian 
there are left only a few fragments. We learn from one of 
these 3 that the Catholic saint, with his expert's knowledge of 
the text, pointed out that the saying "Father, forgive them'* 
in Luke xxiii. 34 is spurious. " The Apostate " had apparently 
quoted it against anticipations of the mediaeval treatment of 
the Jews. On the cult of martyrs, the Bishop of Alexandria's 
reply is not without point, as Julian would have been the first 
to allow 4 . The Greeks themselves, he says 5 , go in procession 
to the tombs and celebrate the praises of those who fought for 
Greece; yet they do not worship them as gods. No more do 
we offer to our martyrs the worship due to God, nor do we 
pray to them. Moreover, the gods of the Gentiles were men 
who were born and died, and the tombs of some of them re- 
main. Connected with this recurrence to the "Euhemerism" 

1 Neumann, Prolegomena, pp. 8-9. 

2 Neumann, Prolegomena, p. 20: Mwvcriws ovdev aTroaufcTcu. avyypd/j,pMTa 
yap TravTO. avvefxTreirpriadai ry vaip Aeyercu. Sera 5' e7r' dvofxari Mww^ws eypdepr) 
fiera raOra, /xerd x^ La ^ai tKarbv /cat dySorjKOVTa £t7) tt}s Mwwews TeXevrrjs vwb 
"EcrSpa /cat tuv dfup' avrbv crvueypafir). 

3 Neumann, pp. 69, 130-1. 

4 Cf. Ep. 78. 5 Neumann, pp. 85-6. 

w. 10 



146 THE POLEMIC [CH. 

which the Christian Fathers sometimes borrowed from Greek 
speculators on the origin of religion, is a quotation from Por- 
phyry's Life of Pythagoras; introduced, Neumann conjectures 
(p. 80), to prove that the Greeks had no right to be incredulous 
about the declaration (1 Peter iii. 19, 20) that Christ preached 
to the spirits in prison; since Pythagoras is represented as 
having descended into the Idaean cave (here apparently 
identified with the underworld) where the tomb of Jupiter 
was. 

On the relation of Christianity to its Hebrew origins, and on 
these as compared with the poetry and philosophy of Greece, 
a coherent account of Julian's view can be put together. He 
seems to have begun by speaking of the intuitive knowledge 
men have of God. To such knowledge, he says, — perhaps with 
an allusion to the elements of Gnostic pessimism that had 
found their way into orthodox Christianity, — has usually been 
attached the conviction that the heavens, as distinguished 
from the earth, are a diviner part of the universe, though it 
is not meant by this that the earth is excluded from divine 
care. He entirely repudiates the fables about Cronos swallow- 
ing his children, and about the incestuous marriages of Zeus, 
and so forth. But, he proceeds, the story of the Garden of 
Eden is equally mythical. Unless it has some secret meaning, 
it is full of blasphemy, since it represents God as forbidding 
to his creatures that knowledge of good and evil which alone 
is the bond of human intelligence, and as envious of their 
possible immortality. In what do stories like that of the 
talking serpent — according to the account, the real benefactor 
of the human race — differ from those invented by the Greeks? 
Compare the Mosaic with the Platonic cosmogony, and its 
speculative weakness becomes plain. In the language of the 
Book of Genesis there is no accurate definition. Some things, 
we are told, God commanded to come into being; others he 
"made"; others he separated out. As to the Spirit (Trvev/jua) 
of God, there is no clear determination whether it was made, 
or came to be, or is eternal without generation. According to 
Moses, if we are to argue from what he says explicitly 1 , God is 

1 Angels, Julian contends elsewhere, are the equivalents, in the Hebrew 



VIII] AGAINST CHRISTIANITY 147 

not the creator of anything incorporeal, but is only a shaper 
of underlying matter. According to Plato, on the other hand, 
the intelligible and invisible gods of which the visible sun and 
moon and stars are images, proceed from the Demiurgus, as 
does also the rational soul of man. Who then speaks better 
and more worthily of God, the "idolater" Plato, or he of 
whom the Scripture says that God spoke with him mouth to 
mouth? 

Contrast now the opinions of the Hebrews and of the Greeks 
about the relations of the Creator to the various races of man- 
kind. According to Moses and all who have followed the 
Hebrew tradition, the Creator of the world chose the Hebrews 
for his own people, and cared for them only. Moses has no- 
thing to say about the divine government of other nations, 
unless one should. concede that he assigns to them the sun and 
moon for deities (Deut. iv. 19). Paul changes in an elusive 
manner 1 ; but if, as he says sometimes (Rom. iii. 29), God is 
not the God of the Jews only, why did he neglect so long all 
but one small nation settled less than two thousand years ago 
in a portion of Palestine? Our teachers say that their creator 
is the common father and king of all, and that the peoples are 
distributed by him to presiding deities, each of whom rules 
over his allotted nation or city. In the Father, all things are 
perfect and all things are one; in the divided portions, one 
power is predominant here, another there. Thus Ares is said 
to rule over warlike nations, Athena over those that are war- 
like with wisdom, and so forth. Let the appeal be to the facts. 
Do not these differences in the characters of nations exist? 
And it cannot be said that the differences in the parts are un- 
caused without denying that providence governs the whole. 
Human laws are not the cause of them, for it is by the natural 
characters of men that the laws peculiar to each people are 
determined. Legislators by the lead they give can do little in 

Scriptures, of the gods of polytheism. No doubt Moses held that they were 
produced by divine power, and were not independently existing beings ; but, 
pre-eminent as their rank in the universe must be, he has no account to give 
of them in his cosmogony, where we should have expected to find one. 

1 The words are given from Cyril by Neumann (p. 177, 11): wWep ol 
TToXuirodes irpbs ras Trerpas. 

10—2 



148 THE POLEMIC [CH. 

comparison with nature and custom. Take the case of the 
Western races. Though they have been so long under Roman 
rule, you find extremely few among them showing aptitude 
for philosophy or geometry or any of the sciences. The 
cleverest appreciate only debate and oratory, and concern 
themselves with no other branch of knowledge. So strong is 
nature. 

The cause assigned by Moses for the diversity of languages 
is altogether mythical. And yet those who demand that the 
Greeks should believe the story of the tower of Babel, them- 
selves disbelieve what Homer tells about the Aloadae, how 
they thought to pile three mountains on one another, Xv ovpavos 
a/jLfiaros etrj K One story is neither more nor less fabulous than 
the other. While Moses thus tries to account for the varieties 
of human speech, neither he nor any of his successors has a 
clear cause to assign for the diversity of manners and customs 
and constitutions, which is greater than that of languages. 
What need to go through the particulars : the freedom-loving 
and insubordinate ways of the German tribes ; the submissive- 
ness and tameness of the Syrians and Persians and Parthians, 
and, in a word, of all the barbarians towards the East and the 
South? 

How can a God who takes no providential care for human 
interests like those of legal and political order, and who has 
sent no teachers or legislators except to the Hebrews, claim 
reverence or gratitude from those whose good, both mental 
and physical, he has thus left to chance? But let us see 
whether the Creator of the world — be he the same as the God 
of the Hebrews or not — has so neglected all other men. 

First, however, the point must be insisted on, that it is not 
sufficient in assigning the cause of a thing to say that God 
commanded it. The natures of the things that come into 
existence must be in conformity with the commands of God. 
If fire is to be borne upwards and earth downwards, fire must 
be light and earth heavy. Similarly, if there are to be differ- 
ences of speech and political constitution, they must be in 

1 Od. xi. 316. 



VIII] AGAINST CHRISTIANITY 149 

accordance with pre-existing differences of nature. Any one 
who will look may see how much Germans and Scythians 
differ in body from Libyans and Aethiopians. Is this also a 
mere command? Do not air too and geographical situation act 
together with the gods to produce a certain complexion? In 
reality, the commands of God are either the natures of things 
or accordant with the natures of things. To suppose these 
natural diversities all ordered under a divine government 
appropriate to each, is to have a better opinion of the God 
announced by Moses, if he is indeed the Lord of all, than that 
of Hebrew and Christian exclusiveness. 

Julian now turns to the detailed comparison. The admired 
decalogue, he observes, contains no commandments not recog- 
nised by all nations, except to have no other gods and to keep 
the Sabbath Day. For the transgression of the rest, penalties 
are imposed everywhere, sometimes harsher, sometimes milder, 
sometimes much the same as those of the Mosaic law. The 
commandment to worship no other gods has joined with it the 
slander that God is jealous. The philosophers tell us to imitate 
the gods as far as possible ; and they say that we can imitate 
them by contemplating the things that exist and so making 
ourselves free from passion. But what is the imitation of God 
celebrated among the Hebrews? Wrath and anger and savage 
zeal. Take the instance of Phinehas (Num. xxv. 11), who is 
represented as turning aside God's wrath by being jealous 
along with him. 

In proof that God did not care only for the Hebrews, 
consider the various gifts bestowed on other peoples. Were 
the beginnings of knowledge given to the chosen race? The 
theory of celestial phenomena was brought to completion by 
the Greeks after the first observations had been made in 
Babjdon. The science of geometry, taking its origin from the 
art of mensuration in Egypt, grew to its present magnitude. 
The study of numbers, beginning from the Phoenician mer- 
chants, at length assumed the form of scientific knowledge 
among the Greeks, who, combining this science with the 
others, discovered the laws of musical intervals. 

Shall I, the Emperor continues, mention the names of 



150 THE POLEMIC [CH. 

illustrious Greeks as they occur, or bring them under the 
various heads, — philosophers, generals, artificers, lawgivers? 
The hardest and cruellest of the generals will be found dealing 
more leniently with those who have committed the greatest 
crimes than Moses with perfectly unoffending people. Other 
nations have not wanted legislators in sacred things. The 
Romans, for example, have their Numa, who also delivered 
his laws under divine inspiration. The spirit from the gods, 
Julian allows in a digression, comes seldom and to few among 
men. Hebrew prophecy has ceased; none remains among the 
Egyptians; the indigenous oracles of Greece have yielded to 
the revolutions of time and are silent. You, he says, turning 
to the Christians, had no cause to desert us and go over to the 
Hebrews for any greater gifts they have to boast of from God; 
and yet, having done so, you would have done well to adhere 
to their discipline with exactitude. You would not then have 
worshipped, not merely one, but many dead men. You would 
have been under a harsh law with much of the barbarous in it, 
instead of our mild and humane laws, and would have been 
worse in most things though better as regards religious purity 
(ayvorepot, 8e kcli KaBapcorepoi rd<; ayio-reias). But now you do 
not even know whether Jesus spoke of purity. You emulate 
the angry spirit and bitterness of the Jews, overturning tem- 
ples and altars and slaughtering not only those who remain 
true to their paternal religion but also the heretics among 
yourselves 1 . These things, however, belong to you and not to 
your teachers. Nowhere did Jesus leave you such commands 
or Paul. 

1 Cf. Ep. 52, where Julian recalls several massacres of "the so-called 
heretics" (t<2v Xeyo/nevtov alperiKuv) in the reign of his predecessor Constantius. 
Those who are called clerics, he says, are not content with impunity for their 
past misdeeds; but craving the lordship they had before, when they could 
deliver judgments and write wills and appropriate the portions of others, they 
pull every string of disorder and add fuel to the flames {irdvTa kivowiv dKoa/iias 
Kahuv /ecu to Xeyofxeuov irvp eiri irvp oxtreijovcn). At the opening of the epistle, he 
professes to find that he was mistaken in the thought that "the rulers of the 
Galilaeans" would regard him more favourably than his Arian predecessor, 
under whom they were banished and imprisoned and had their goods con- 
fiscated; whereas he himself has repealed their sentences and restored to them 
their own. 



VIII] AGAINST CHRISTIANITY 151 

To return: the gods gave Rome the empire; to the Jews 
they granted only for a short time to be free ; for the most part , 
they made them alien sojourners and subject to other nations. 
In war, in civil government, in the fine and useful arts, in the 
liberal sciences, there is hardly a name to be mentioned among 
the Hebrews. Solomon, who is celebrated among them for his 
wisdom, served other gods, deceived by his wife (v7ro rr}^ 
yvvcutcos), they say. This, if it were so, would not be a mark 
of wisdom; but may he not have paid due honour to the 
religions of the rest of the world by his own judgment and by 
the instruction of the God who manifested himself to him? 
For envy and jealousy are so far from angels and gods that 
they do not extend even to the best men, but belong only to 
the demons. 

If the reading of your own scriptures is sufficient for you, 
why do you nibble at Greek learning? Why, having gone over 
to the Hebrews, do you depart further from what their pro- 
phets declare than from our own manners? The Jewish ritual 
is very exact, and requires a sacerdotal life and profession to 
fulfil it. The lawgiver bids you serve only one God, but he 
adds that you shall "not revile the gods" (Exod. xxii. 28). 
The brutality of those who came after thought that not 
serving them ought to be accompanied by blaspheming them. 
This you have taken from the Jews. From us you have taken 
the permission to eat of everything. That the earliest Christian 
converts were much the same as those of to-day is proved by 
what Paul says of them (1 Cor. vi. 9-11). Baptism, of which 
the Apostle speaks as the remedy, will not even wash off 
diseases and disfigurements from the body. Will it then re- 
move every kind of transgression out of the soul? 

The Christians, however, say that, while they differ from the 
present Jews, they are in strictness Israelites according to the 
prophets, and agree with Moses and those who followed him. 
They say, for example, that Moses foretold Christ. But Moses 
repeatedly declares that one God only is to be honoured. It is 
true that he mentions angels, and admits many gods in this 
sense; but he allows no second God comparable with the first. 
The sayings usually quoted by the Christians from Moses and 



152 THE POLEMIC [CH. 

Isaiah have no application to the son of Mary 1 . Moses speaks 
of angels as the sons of God (Gen. vi. 2); Israel is called the 
firstborn son of God (Exod. iv. 22), and many sons of God 
(i.e. angels) are recognised as having the nations for their 
portion; but nothing is said of a Firstborn Son of God, or 
#eo? \6yo$, in the sense of the Christian doctrine. 

At this point comes a disquisition on the agreement, in all 
but a few things, of Hebrew and of Greek religion. According 
to Cyril, Julian argued that Moses commanded an offering, in 
the form of the scapegoat (Levit. xvi. 8), to unclean demons 
(fiiapois teal airoTpoTraioi<s haifjbocn). In not following the 
general custom of sacrificing, the Christians stand apart from 
the Jews as well as from all other nations. But the Jews, they 
will say, do not sacrifice. The reason, however, is that they do 
not think it lawful for them to sacrifice except at Jerusalem, 
and that they have been deprived of their temple. And they 
still keep up customs which are in effect sacrificial, and abstain 
from some kinds of meat. All this the Christians neglect. 
That the law in these matters was at some future time to be 
annulled, there is not the slightest suggestion in the books of 
Moses. On the contrary, the legislator distinctly declares that 
it is to be perpetual. 

That Jesus is God neither Paul nor Matthew nor Luke nor 
Mark ventured to assert. The assertion was first made — not 
quite distinctly, though there is no doubt about the meaning — 
by the worthy John, who perceived that a great multitude in 
many of the Grecian and Italian cities was taken hold of by 
this malady 2 , and who had heard, as may be supposed, that 
the tombs of Peter and Paul were secretly objects of adoration 



1 A more exact discussion of them was left over for the second part, to 
which Cyril's reply has not been preserved. The point is made in passing 
that anything which may be said of a ruler from Judah (Gen. xlix. 10) can 
have no reference to Jesus, since, according to the Christians, he was not the 
son of Joseph but of the Holy Spirit. Besides, the genealogies of Matthew 
and Luke, tracing the descent of Joseph from Judah, are discrepant. 

2 What Julian has in view here is not any and every form of apotheosis, 
but, as the context shows, the devotion to corpses and relics, which seemed 
to him to distinguish the Christians from Jews and Greeks alike. In Ep. 49 
he even commends their care about tombs. 



VIII] AGAINST CHRISTIANITY 153 

at Rome. In their adoration of tombs and sepulchres, the 
Christians do not listen to the words of Jesus of Nazareth, 
who said they were full of all uncleanness (Matth. xxiii. 27). 
Whence this comes, the prophet Isaiah shall say. It is the 
old superstition of those who "remain among the graves, and 
lodge in the monuments" (Is. lxv. 4), for the purpose of 
divining by dreams. This art the apostles most likely prac- 
tised after their master's end, and handed it down to their 
successors. 

And you, Julian proceeds, who practise things which God 
abominated from the beginning through Moses and the pro- 
phets, yet refuse to offer sacrifices. Thence he returns to the 
point that, if the Christians would be true Israelites, they 
ought to follow the Jewish customs, and that these on the 
whole agree more with the customs of "the Gentiles" than 
with their own. Approval of animal sacrifices is clearly 
implied in the account of the offerings of Cain and Abel. 
Circumcision, which was enjoined on Abraham and his seed 
for ever, the Christians do not practise, though Christ said 
that he was not come to destroy the law. " We circumcise our 
hearts," they say. By all means, replies Julian, for none 
among you is an evildoer, none is wicked ; thus you circumcise 
your hearts. Abraham, he goes on to interpret the account in 
Genesis xv., practised divination from shooting-stars (v. 5), 
and augury from the flight of birds (v. 11). The merit of his 
faith therefore consisted not in believing without but with a 
sign of the truth of the promise made to him. Faith without 
truth is foolishness. 

Incomplete as the reconstruction necessarily remains, there 
is enough to show the general line the Emperor took. It was 
to deny any ground, in the Old Testament as it stood, for the 
idea of Christianity as a universalised Judaism. All else is in- 
cidental to this. If then no religion was meant to be universal, 
but Judaism, in so far as it excludes other religions, is only for 
Jews, the idea of Christian theocracy loses its credentials. 
Divine government is not through a special society teaching 
an authoritative doctrine, but through the order of the visible 
universe and all the variety of civic and national institutions 



154 THE POLEMIC AGAINST CHRISTIANITY [CH.vni 

in the world. The underlying harmony of these is to be sought 
out by free examination, which is philosophy. Of philosophy, 
accordingly, and not of polytheism as such, Julian was the 
champion. And if the system he opposed did not succeed in 
finally subjugating the philosophy and culture for which he 
cared, that was due not to any modification in the aims and 
ideals of its chiefs, but to the revival of forces which in their 
turn broke the unity of the cosmopolitan Church as the 
Church had broken the unity of the Roman State. 



CHAPTER IX 

THE ATHENIAN SCHOOL 

1. The Academy becomes Neo-Platonic. 

About the opening of the fifth century, the chair of Plato 
was occupied by Plutarch, an Athenian by birth and the first 
distinguished representative at Athens of Neo-Platonism. By 
what particular way the Neo-Platonic doctrine had reached 
Athens is unknown; but Plutarch and the "Platonic succes- 
sors" (AtdBo^ot TlXarcoviKOi) who followed him, connected 
themselves directly with the school of Iamblichus, and through 
Iamblichus with Porphyry and Plotinus. Their entrance on 
the new line of thought was to be the beginning of a revival 
of philosophical and scientific activity which continued till the 
succession was closed by the edict of Justinian in 529. Strictly, 
it may be said to have continued a little longer; for the latest 
works of the school at Athens were written some years after 
that date. From that year, however, no other teacher was 
allowed to profess Hellenic philosophy publicly; so that it 
may with sufficient accuracy be taken as fixing the end of the 
Academy, and with it of the ancient schools. 

Approximately coincident with the first phase of the revival 
at Athens, was the brilliant episode of the school at Alexandria, 
where Neo-Platonism was now taught by Hypatia as its 
authorised exponent. Of her writings nothing remains, though 
the titles of some mathematical ones are preserved. What is 
known is that she followed the tradition of Iamblichus, whose 
doctrines appear in the works of her pupil and correspondent 
Synesius. Her fate in 415 at the hands of the Alexandrian 
monks, under the patriarchate of Cyril (as recorded by the 
ecclesiastical historian Socrates), was not followed imme- 
diately by the cessation of the Alexandrian chair of philo- 
sophy, which indeed continued to have occupants longer than 
any other. Between 415 and 450, Hierocles, the author of the 



156 THE ATHENIAN SCHOOL [CH. 

commentary on the Pythagorean Golden Verses, still professed 
Neo-Platonism. He was a pupil of Plutarch at Athens, but 
took up the office of teacher at Alexandria, of which he was 
a native. He too was an adherent of the old religion ; and, for 
something he had said that was thought disrespectful towards 
the new, he was sentenced by a Christian magistrate of Con- 
stantinople to be scourged 1 . Several more names of Alexan- 
drian commentators are recorded ; ending with Olympiodorus 
in the latter part of the sixth century 2 . All these names, how- 
ever, — beginning with Hierocles, — belong in reality to the 
Athenian succession 3 . 

Plutarch died at an advanced age in 431. His successor 
was Syrianus of Alexandria, who had been his pupil and for 
some time his associate in the chair. Among the opinions of 
Plutarch, it is recorded that with Iamblichus he extends im- 
mortality to the irrational part of the soul, whereas Proclus 
and Porphyry limit it to the rational part 4 . A psychological 
position afterwards developed by Proclus may be noted in his 
mode of denning the place of imagination (fyavraala) between 

1 See the note, pp. 9-10, in Gaisford's edition of the Commentary on the 
Golden Verses, appended as a second volume to his edition of the Eclogues of 
Stobaeus (Oxford, 1850). 

2 See Zeller, iii. 2, p. 852, n. 1, where it is shown that Olympiodorus the 
commentator on Plato is identical with the Olympiodorus who wrote (later 
than 564) the commentary on Aristotle's Meteorology. Olympiodorus the 
Aristotelian teacher of Proclus at Alexandria is of course much earlier. 

3 In one of his commentaries, Olympiodorus remarks that the succession 
still continues in spite of the many confiscations (/cat raOra -rroXXQv dyp-eucreuv 
yivofievwv). This, according to Zeller, refers to the succession at Alexandria, 
not at Athens; but all the Alexandrian teachers of this last period received 
their philosophical inspiration, directly or indirectly, from the occupants of 
the chair at Athens, and in that way come within the Athenian school. 

4 See the quotation from Olympiodorus given by Zeller, ii. 1, p. 1008, n. 4, 
where the views of different philosophers on this subject are compactly stated. 
For its convenience as a conspectus, it may be given here; though qualifica- 
tions are needed when we come to the subtleties, as will be seen in the case of 
Proclus. Olympiodor. in Phaed. p. 98 Finckh: on oi fiev dirb ttJs XoyiKr/s 
ipvxys &XP L T V S €/j.\pvxov e£ews diradavaTi^ovcnv, cjs TSovfi-qvios' oi 8e p.e\pi t V s 
(frvaeajs, ws HXwt'lvos £vi oirov oi 8e p.e\pt T V$ dXoyias, ws rQiv p.ev iraXai<2v 
A€vokp&tt]s /cat "Zirevo-iiriros, tQv de veuntpuiv 'Id/x^Xcxos /cat HXolJTapxos' oi de 
fiexP L P-ovr\% -7-775 Xoyucrjs, w$ UpoKXos /cat TLopcptipw oi de p<£xP L P-dvov rod vov, 
(pdeipovtJL yap ttju 86%av, ws woXXoi tQv YlepnrarrjTiKtjiy oi de p.^XP L T V* ^V* 
^u%t}s, (bQeipovcn. yap -ras ju.epi.Kds et's ttju 6Xnv. 



IX] THE ATHENIAN SCHOOL 157 

thought and perception 1 . By Plutarch first, and then by 
Syrianus, the use of Aristotle as an introduction to Plato, with 
insistence on their agreements rather than on their differences, 
was made systematic in the school. Most of its activity hence- 
forth takes the form of exceedingly elaborate critical commen- 
taries 2 . It is not that originality or the recognition of it alto- 
gether ceases. When any philosopher introduces a distinctly 
new point of view, it is mentioned in his honour by his suc- 
cessors. In the main, however, the effort was towards syste- 
matising what had been done. This was the work specially 
reserved for the untiring activity of Proclus. 

2. Proclus. 

We now come to the last great name among the Neo- 
Platonists. After Plotinus, Proclus was undoubtedly the most 
original thinker, as well as the ablest systematiser, of the 
school. His abilities were early recognised, and the story of 
an omen that occurred on his arrival at Athens was treasured 
up. He had lingered outside and arrived at the Acropolis a 
little late, as his biographer records 3 ; and the porter said to 
him, "If you had not come, I should have shut the gates." 
His life was written by his successor in the Academic chair, 
some time before the decree of Justinian ; so that this anecdote 
has the interest of showing what the feeling already was in the 
school about its prospects for the future. 

Proclus (or Proculus) was born at Constantinople in 410, but 
was of a Lycian family. His father w T as a jurist; and he him- 
self studied at Alexandria first rhetoric and Roman law, after- 
wards mathematics and philosophy. Under Olympiodorus, his 

1 Philop. de An. (Zeller, iii. 2, p. 751, n. 2). rdv /j.ev uladr}Ti2v to 5t.rip7jfji.4voj' 
ci's eV avvadpoi^ei, to 5£ tQiv deiwv arrXovv /cat ws av tis etiroi evixbv ei's tvttovs 
rivets koI yu.op0as 5ta06pous avafA&TTeTai. 

2 Plutarch wrote an important commentary on Aristotle's De Anirna. 
Between the commentary of Alexander of Aphrodisias (fl. 200) and that of 
Plutarch, says Zeller (iii. 2, p. 749, n. 4), none is on record except the para- 
phrase of Themistius. Syrianus, besides many other commentaries, wrote 
one on the Metaphysics. The portions formerly published are referred to by 
Vacherot, Histoire Critique de VEcole d'Alexandrie, t. ii. livre iii. ch. 1, and 
Zeller, iii. 2, p. 761, n. 2. A complete edition by W. Kroll appeared in 1902. 

3 Marinus, Vita Prodi, c. 10. 



158 THE ATHENIAN SCHOOL [CH. 

Alexandrian teacher, he rapidly acquired proficiency in the 
Aristotelian logic. Becoming dissatisfied with the philosophi- 
cal teaching at Alexandria, he went to Athens when he was not 
quite twenty. There he was instructed both by Syrianus and 
by Plutarch, who, notwithstanding his great age, was willing 
to continue his teaching for the sake of a pupil of such pro- 
mise. At that time Proclus abstained severely from animal 
food, and Plutarch advised him to eat a little flesh, but with- 
out avail; Syrianus for his part approving of this rigour 1 . His 
abstinence remained all but complete throughout his life. 
When he deviated from it, it was only to avoid the appearance 
of singularity 2 . By his twenty-eighth year he had written 
his commentary on the Timaeus, in addition to many other 
treatises. According to Marinus, he exercised influence on 
public affairs ; but he was once obliged to leave Athens for a 
year. The school secretly adhered to the ancient religion, the 
practice of which was of course now illegal. His year's exile 
Proclus spent in acquiring a more exact knowledge of the 
ancient religious rites of Lycia 3 . Marinus describes him as an 
illustration of the happiness of the sage in the type of per- 
fection conceived of by Aristotle — for he enjoyed external 
good fortune and lived to the full period of human life — and 
as a model of the ascetic virtues in the ideal form set forth by 
Plotinus. He was of a temper at once hasty and placable; 
and examples are given of his practical sympathy with his 
friends 4 . Besides his originality and critical spirit in philo- 
sophy, his proficiency in theurgy is celebrated 5 , and various 
marvels are related of him. He died at Athens in 485 6 . 

The saying of Proclus has often been quoted from his bio- 
graphy, that the philosopher ought not to observe the religious 
customs of one city or country only, but to be the common 

1 Marinus, Vita Prodi, c. 12. 

2 Ibid., 19: el 5e irore naipos ris laxvporepos iirl ttjv tovtojv (sc. tQ>v i/j.\f/vxuv) 
Xpr\<nv iK&\ei, fxbvov aireyetiero, kcu tovto balas X^P LV - 

3 Ibid., 15. 4 Ibid., 17. 5 Ibid,, 28. 

6 The dates of his birth and death are fixed by the statement of Marinus 
(c. 36) that he died, at the age of 75, "in the 124th year from the reign of 
Julian." This, as Zeller shows (iii. 2, p. 776, n. 1), must be referred to the 
beginning and not to the end of Julian's reign. 



IX] THE ATHENIAN SCHOOL 159 

hierophant of the whole world. The closeness, however, with 
which he anticipated in idea Comte's Religion of Humanity, 
does not seem to have been noticed. First, we are told that he 
practised the ceremonial abstinences prescribed for the sacred 
days of all religions, adding certain special days fixed by the 
appearance of the moon 1 . In a later chapter, Marinus tells us 
about his cult of the dead. Every year, on certain days, he 
visited the tombs of the Attic heroes, then of the philosophers, 
then of his friends and connexions generally. After performing 
the customary rites, he went away to the Academy; where he 
poured libations first to the souls of his kindred and race, then 
to those of all philosophers, finally to those of all men. The 
last observance corresponds precisely to the Positivist "Day 
of All the Dead," and indeed is described by Marinus almost 
in the identical words 2 . 

A saying quoted with not less frequency than that referred 
to above, is the declaration of Proclus that if it were in his 
power he would withdraw from the knowledge of men for the 
present all ancient books except the Timaeus and the Sacred 
Oracles 3 . The reason he gave was that persons coming to 
them without preparation are injured; but the manner in 
which the aspiration was soon to be fulfilled in the Western 
world 4 suggests that the philosopher had a deeper reason. 
May he not have seen the necessity of a break in culture if a 
new line of intellectual development was ever to be struck 

1 Marinus, 19: ical iduc&repov 8e tivcls &7]<7T€v<rev ij/x^pas 4£ iiri<paveiat. The 
note in Cousin's edition (Prodi Opera Inedita, Paris, 1864) seems to give the 
right interpretation: "'E£ eTri<f>aveias, ex apparentia, scilicet lunae, ut monet 
Fabricius et indicant quae sequuntur." Zeller (iii. 2, p. 784, n. 5) refers the 
observance to special revelations from the gods to Proclus himself. 

2 Ibid., 36: ical iirl iracn rotirois 6 ev ay for oltos rplrov ak\ov irepiypaxj/as tqttov, 
7rd(rcus iv avrip tcus tQ>v airoixoixivoiv avdp&iruv \pvx^ a<pa)<rtovTo. 

3 Ibid., 38: elwdet. de 7ro\\d/us kol tovto XeYeip, 6'rt ' Ktipios el rjv, fxbva av rwv 
dpx cu ' a »' OLiravrcov fiifikiiav eiroiovv (frtpeadat. tol Adyta Kal rbv Tifxaiov, ra 5e d\Xa 
rj(j>avi^ov etc tuv vvv dvOpuiiroiv.' 

4 Corresponding to the Oracles, which Proclus would have kept still 
current, were of course in the West the Hebrew and Christian Scriptures and 
the Fathers. Of these he was not thinking; but, curiously, along with the few 
compendia of logic and "the liberal arts" which furnished almost the sole 
elements of European culture for centuries, there was preserved a fragment 
of the Timaeus in Latin translation. 



160 THE ATHENIAN SCHOOL [CH. 

out? He and his school, indeed, devoted themselves to the 
task, not of effacing accumulated knowledge for a time, but 
of storing it up. Still, in the latter part of the period, they 
must have been consciously preserving it for a dimly foreseen 
future rather than for the next age. Whatever may have been 
the intention of the utterance, it did as a matter of fact pre- 
figure the conditions under which a new culture was to be 
evolved in the West. 

That the Neo-Platonists had in some respects more of Hel- 
lenic moderation than Plato has been indicated already; and 
this may be noted especially in the case of Proclus, who on 
occasion protests against what is overstrained in the Platonic 
ethics. His biographer takes care to show that he possessed 
and exercised the political as a basis for the "cathartic" 
virtues 1 . And while ascetic and contemplative virtue, in his 
view as in that of all the school, is higher than practical 
virtue, its conditions, he points out, are not to be imposed on 
the active life. Thus he is able to defend Homer's manner of 
describing his heroes. The soul of Achilles in Hades is rightly 
represented as still desiring association with the body, because 
that is the condition for the display of practical virtue. Men 
living the practical life could not live it strenuously if they 
were not intensely moved by feelings that have reference to 
particular persons and things. The heroic character, there- 
fore, while it is apt for great deeds, is also subject to grief. 
Plato himself would have to be expelled from his own ideal 
State for the variety of his dramatic imitations. Only in 
societies falling short of that severe simplicity could lifelike 
representations of buffoons and men of inferior moral type, 
such as we meet with in Plato, be allowed. Besides, he varies 
from one dialogue to another in the opinions he seems to be 
conveying, and so himself departs from his ideal. Where Plato 
then is admitted, there is no reason why Homer too should not 
be admitted 2 . 

1 Marinus, 14-17. 

2 The defence of Homer is to be found in the Commentary on the Republic. 
Cf. Zeller, iii. 2, p. 818, n. 4, for references to the portion of it cited. Zeller, 
however, represents as a concession what is really a contention. 



IX] THE ATHENIAN SCHOOL 161 

A large part of the activity of Proclus was given to com- 
menting directly on Plato; but he also wrote mathematical 
works 1 , philosophical expositions of a more independent kind, 
and Hymns to the Gods 2 , in which the mythological person- 
ages are invoked as representatives of the powers by which 
the contemplative devotee rises from the realm of birth and 
change to that of immutable being. Of the philosophical 
works that do not take the form of commentaries on par- 
ticular treatises, we possess an extensive one entitled Platonic 
Theology; three shorter ones on Providence, Fate, and Evils, 
preserved only in a Latin translation made in the thirteenth 
century by William of Morbeka, Archbishop of Corinth ; and 
the Theological Elements (2ro*%etW/9 SeoXoyiiaf)). All these 
have been published 3 . Of the last, an attempt will be made to 
set forth the substance. In its groundwork, it is an extremely 
condensed exposition of the Plotinian doctrine; but it also 
contains the most important modifications made in Neo- 
Platonism by Proclus himself. The whole is in the form of 
dialectical demonstration, and may perhaps best be com- 
pared, as regards method, with Spinoza's expositions of 
Cartesianism. An abstract of so condensed a treatise cannot 
of course do justice to its argumentative force, since much 
must necessarily be omitted that belongs to the logical develop- 
ment ; but some idea may be given of the genuine individual 
power of Proclus as a thinker. A " scholastic " turn of expres- 
sion, remarked on by the historians, will easily be observed; 
but Proclus is not a Scholastic in the sense that he in principle 
takes any doctrine whatever simply as given from without. 

1 See, on one of these, Appendix III. A short treatise on Astronomy 
('T7ro7-tf7rwcrij tlov aarpovofJUKwv virodiaeuv) and one on Physics (Srotxetwcrts 
(pva-iKrj) have been published, with German translation, in the Teubner Series; 
the first in 1909, the second in 1912. 

2 Seven of these have been preserved. See the end of Cousin's collection. 
Like Porphyry's De Antro Nympharum, they have a charm of their own for 
those who are, in Aristotle's phrase, <pi\6fivdoi. 

3 The Platonic Theology does not seem to have been reprinted since 1618, 
when it appeared along with a Latin translation by Aemilius Portus. An 
English translation, by Thomas Taylor, was published in 1816. The next 
three works are placed at the beginning of Cousin's collection. The ZroixeLoxns 
is printed after the Sententiae of Porphyry in the Didot edition of Plotinus. 

w. 11 



162 THE ATHENIAN SCHOOL [CH. 

As a commentator, no doubt his aim is to explain Plato; 
and here the critics cannot fairly complain when he says that 
his object is only to set forth what the master taught. Indeed 
the complaint that he is a "scholastic" in this sense is neu- 
tralised by the opposite objection that his Platonic Theology 
contains more of Neo-Platonism than of Plato. And one 
point of his teaching — not comprised in the treatise now to 
be expounded — seems to have been generally misunderstood. 
In more than one place 1 he describes belief (7u<7T£?) as higher 
than knowledge (yvdocris), because only by belief is that Good 
to be reached which is the supreme end of aspiration. This 
has been supposed to be part of a falling away from pure 
philosophy, though Zeller allows that, after all, the ultimate 
aim of Proclus "goes as much beyond positive religion as 
beyond methodical knowing 2 ." And in fact the notion of 
"belief," as Proclus formulates it, instead of being a resigna- 
tion of the aims of earlier philosophy, seems rather to be a 
rendering into more precise subjective terms of Plato's mean- 
ing in the passage of the Republic where Socrates gives up the 
attempt at an adequate account of the Idea of the Good 3 . 
As Plotinus had adopted for the highest point of his onto- 
logical system the Platonic position that the Good is beyond 
even Being 4 , so Proclus formulated a definite principle of 
cognition agreeing with what Plato indicates as the attitude 
of the mind when it at last descries the object of its search. 
At the extreme of pure intellect — at the point, as we might 
say, which terminates the highest segment of the line re- 
presenting the kinds of cognition with their objects — is a 
mode of apprehension which is not even " dialectical," because 
it is at the very origin of dialectic. And to call this "belief" 
is to prepare a return from the mysticism of Plotinus — which 
Proclus, however, does not give up — to the conception of a 
mental state which, while not strictly cognitive, is a common 
instead of a peculiar experience. The contradiction between 
this view and that which makes belief as "opinion" lower 

1 Cf. R. P. 543; Zeller, iii. 2, p. 820. 

2 iii. 2, p. 823. 3 Rep. vi. 506. 
4 Rep. vi. 509. 



ix] THE ATHENIAN SCHOOL 163 

than knowledge is only apparent 1 . A view of the kind has 
become more familiar since. Put in the most general terms 
it is this: that while belief in its sense of opinion is below 
scientific knowledge, belief as the apprehension of meta- 
physical principles is above it; because scientific knowledge, 
if not attached to some metaphysical principle, vanishes 
under analysis into mere relations of illusory appearances. 

The method of discriminating subordinate triads within 
each successive stage of emanation, which is regarded as 
characteristic of Proclus, had been more and more elaborated 
during the whole interval from Plotinus. The increasing use of 
it by Porphyry, by Iamblichus, and by their disciple Theodore 
of Asine, is noted by the historians. Suggestions of the later 
developments are to be met with in Plotinus himself, who, for 
example, treats being, though in its essence identical with in- 
tellect, as prior if distinguished from it, and goes on further to 
distinguish life, as a third component of primal Being, from 
being in the special sense and from intellect 2 . This is not in- 
deed the order assigned to the same components by Proclus, 
who puts life, instead of intellect, in the second place ; but the 
germ of the division is there. A doctrine in which he seems to 
have been quite original is that of the "divine henads 3 ," to 
which we shall come in expounding the Elements. For the 
rest, the originality of many things in the treatise, as well as 
its general agreement with Plotinus, will become evident as 
we proceed. 

Every multitude, the treatise begins, participates in a 
manner in the One. For if in a multitude there were no 
unity, it would consist either of parts which are nothings, or 
of parts which are themselves multitudes to infinity. From 

1 Pico della Mirandola seized the general thought of Proclus on this point, 
and applied it specially to philosophical theology. See the "Fifty-five Con- 
clusions according to Proclus" appended to the edition of the Platonic Theology 
already referred to. The words of Pico's forty-fourth proposition are these : 
"Sicut fides, quae est credulitas, est infra intellectum ; ita fides, quae est 
vere fides, est supersubstantialiter supra scientiam et intellectum, nos Deo 
immediate conjungens." 

2 Enn. VI. 6, 8: to ov irpwrov del \af3eli> irpGrov ov, eira vovv, elra to faov. 

3 Cf. Zeller, in. 2, p. 793. 

11—2 



164 THE ATHENIAN SCHOOL [CH. 

this starting-point we are led to the position that every multi- 
tude, being at the same time one and not one, derives its real 
existence from the One in itself (to avroev). 

The producing (to vrapdyov), or that which is productive 
of another (to TrapaKTLKov aXXov), is better than the nature 
of that which is produced (icpelTTov tt}? tov Trapayopuevov 

(f)VO~€Q)<;). 

The first Good is that after which all beings strive, and is 
therefore before all beings. To add to it anything else is to 
lessen it by the addition, making it some particular good 
instead of the Good simply. 

If there is to be knowledge, there must be an order of 
causation, and there must be a first in this order. Causes 
cannot go in a circle : if they did, the same things would be 
prior and posterior, better and worse. Nor can they go in an 
infinite series: to refer back one cause to another without a 
final term would make knowledge impossible 1 . 

Principle and primal cause of all being is the Good. For all 
things aspire to it ; but if there were anything before it in the 
order of causes, that and not the Good would be the end of 
their aspiration. The One simply, and the Good simply, are 
the same. To be made one is to be preserved in being — which 
is a good to particular things ; and to cease to be one is to be 
deprived of being. 

In order that the derivation of motion may not go on in a 
circle or to infinity, there must be an unmoved, which is the 
first mover; and a self-moved, which is the first moved; as 
well as that which is moved by another. The self-moved is 
the mean which joins the extremes 2 . 

Whatever can turn back upon itself, the whole to the whole, 
is incorporeal. For this turning back is impossible for body, 
because of the division of its parts, which lie outside one an- 



1 "Ztoix- GeoX. 11. The order meant here is of course logical, not chrono- 
logical. All existing things depend on an actual first cause of their being. 
£<ttiv atria Trpwrrj tQiv optuv, d0' r/s olov iK pifys irpbeiCLV eKaara, ra fxiv eyyits 
ovra 4k€lvt]s, to. 8e Troppwrepov. 

2 Ztolx. GeoX. 14. Here again the order is purely logical. There is no 
notion of a first impulse given to a world that has a chronological beginning. 



IX] THE ATHENIAN SCHOOL 165 

other in space 1 . That which can thus turn back upon itself, 
has an essence separable from all body. For if it is inseparable 
in essence, it must still more be inseparable in act; were it 
separable only in act, its act would go beyond its essence. 
That is, it would do what, by definition, is not in its power to 
do. But body does not actually turn back upon itself. What- 
ever does thus turn back is therefore separable in essence as 
in act. 

"Beyond all bodies is the essence of soul, and beyond all 
souls the intellectual nature, and beyond all intellectual exist- 
ences the One 2 ." Intellect is unmoved and the giver of motion, 
soul self-moving, body moved by another. If the living body 
moves itself, it is by participation in soul. Similarly, the soul 
through intellect participates in perpetual thought (/jLerexec 
tov del voelv). For if in soul there were perpetual thinking 
primarily, this would be inherent in all souls, like self-motion. 
Since not all souls, as such, have this power, there must be 
before soul the primarily intelligent (to Trpdorco^ votjtikov). 
Again, before intellect there must be the One. For intellect, 
though unmoved, is not one without duality, since it thinks 
itself; and all things whatsoever participate in the One, but 
not all things in intellect. 

To every particular causal chain (aeipd kcu rdgis), there is a 
unity (/j,ovd<;) which is the cause of all that is ordered under 
it. Thus after the primal One there are henads (e^aBe?); and 
after the first intellect, minds (voes); and after the first soul, 
souls ; and after the whole of nature, natures. 

First in order is always that which cannot be participated 
in (to dfjueOetcTov), — the " one before all " as distinguished from 
the one in all. This generates the things that are participated 
in. Inferior to these again are the things that participate, as 
those that are participated in are inferior to the first. 

The perfect in its kind (to Tekeiov), since in so far as it is 
perfect it imitates the cause of all, proceeds to the production 

1 Stoix- Oeo\. 15: ovdev apa aQ/xa irpbs iavrb t£<j>vk€v kiriarpk^iv, ws o\ov 
iir€(XTpd(p9ai. irpbs o\ov. ei' tl apa icpbs eavrb eiri<rrpeirTi.ic6u iariv, d<s^ip.arbv icm 
Kal a/J.ep4s. 

2 Stoix. 0eo\. 20: iravrwv awfxaTwv eiriKeLvd itrnv t) tpvxv* oixxia, Kal iraadv 
\pvx&v iir^Ketva 17 voepa (fujcris, /cat iravQsv tQv voepuv virouTaueuv iTrexeiva to eV. 



166 THE ATHENIAN SCHOOL [CH. 

of as many things as it can ; as the Good causes the existence 
of everything. The more or the less perfect anything is, of the 
more or the fewer things is it the cause, as being nearer to or 
more remote from the cause of all. That which is furthest from 
the principle is unproductive and the cause of nothing. 

The productive cause of other things remains in itself while 
producing 1 . That which produces is productive of the things 
that are second to it, by the perfection and superabundance of 
its power. For if it gave being to other things through defect 
and weakness, they would receive their existence through its 
alteration; but it remains as it is 2 . 

Every productive cause brings into existence things like 
itself before things unlike. Equals it cannot produce, since it 
is necessarily better than its effects. The progression from the 
cause to its effects is accomplished by resemblance of the 
things that are second in order to those that are first 3 . Being 
similar to that which produces it, the immediate product is 
in a manner at once the same with and other than its cause. 
It remains therefore and goes forth at the same time, and 
neither element of the process is apart from the other. Every 
product turns back and tries to reach its cause ; for everything 
strives after the Good, which is the source of its being: and 
the mode of attaining the Good for each thing is through its 
own proximate cause. The return is accomplished by the re- 
semblance the things that return bear to that which they 
return to 4 ; for the aim of the return is union, and it is always 
resemblance that unites. The progression and the^ return 
form a circular activity. There are lesser and greater circles 
according as the return is to things immediately above or to 

1 liToix- QeoK. 26 : el yap fiL/xeirai to eu, iKeivo 8e clkivtitojs v<pl<TT7]<ri rot ^cer' 
avro, kclI irav to nrapdyov Cogclvtus fyei tt)v tov Tra.pa.yeiv afoLav. 

2 ~Ltoix> 6eoX. 27 : ov yap d7rop.epLcriJ.6s ecrrt tov irapdyovTos to rrapayopevov ' 
ovde yap yevecei tovto rrpoarjicev, ovde tois yevvrjTiKOLS alTiois' ovde fieT&ftacris ' ov 
yap v\t) yiveTai tov Trpo'CbvTOS' /j.evet, yap, olou iaTL. Kal to 7rapay6p,evov aXXo Trap 1 
avTo £o~tlv. 

3 2toix. ©eoX. 29: rdaa 7rp6'o8os 8l' 6/j.oi6t7]tos a7T0Te\e?Tai tCov devreptov irpbs 
to. TrpuiTa. 

4 "Ztolx- 6eoX. 32 : Traaa eTio~Tpo<pr} 5i' op.ol6tt)tos aTroTeXeirai tujv iTiarpecpo- 
/j.e'vLov, Tpbs 5 iin.o-Toe'fyeTai. 



IX] THE ATHENIAN SCHOOL 167 

those that are higher. In the great circle to and from the 
principle of all, all things are involved 1 . 

Accordingly, everything that is caused remains in its own 
cause, and goes forth from it, and returns to it 2 . The remain- 
ing (fiovrj) signifies its community with its cause; the going 
forth, its distinction from it (afia yap SiaKpicret irpooSos); the 
return, its innate endeavour after its own good, from which 
its particular being is. Of the things multiplied in progressive 
production, the first are more perfect than the second, these 
than the next, and so forth; for the " progressions " from cause 
to effect are remissions of being (u^>ecret?) of the second as 
compared with the first. In the order of return, on the con- 
trary, the things that are most imperfect come first, the most 
perfect last. Every process of return to a remoter cause is 
through the same intermediate stages as the corresponding 
causal progression. First in the order of return are the things 
that have received from their cause only being (to elvau); 
next, those that have received life with being; last, those that 
have received also the power of cognition. The endeavour 
(opeft?) of the first to return is a mere fitness for participation 
in causes 3 ; the endeavour of the second is "vital," and is a 
motion to the better; that of the third is identical with con- 
scious knowledge of the goodness of their causes (Kara rrjv 
yvwcriv, arvvaLcrOrjcris ovcra rr}<$ rcov alrlcov ayaOoTTjros). 

Between the One without duality, and things that proceed 
from causes other than themselves, is the self-subsistent (to 
avOvTToararov), or that which is the cause of itself. That 
which is in itself, not as in place, but as the effect in the cause, 
is self-subsistent. The self-subsistent has the power of turning 
back upon itself 4 . If it did not thus return, it would not 

1 Srotx- GeoX. 33 : irav to irpo'Cbv diro riuos Kal t-KiGTpz&ov, kvkXiktjv %x €l t V v 
ivtpyeiav. . . . fieifrvs 5e kvkXol kcll iXdrrovs tG>v fxlv e-marpotpCov irpbs ra virepKel/xeva 
avvex&s yivofxhuv, tu>v 5e Trpbs rd avcorepk), Kal fi^xP L T & v iravrwv apxvs* o-^b 
yap €KeLvr)s iravra, Kal irpbs tKelvrjv. 

2 2rot%. GeoX. 35 : irav to alrtarbv Kal ixivei ev rrj avrov airly, Kal irpbetaiv air' 
avrrjs, Kal eVtcrpe^ei wpbs air-qv. 

3 2toi%. GeoX. 39: ovanbdrj iroieiTai rr\v tTnarpo(pr\v. That is to say, they 
tend to be embodied in some definite form, which is their "essence." 

4 2toix» GeoX. 42 : el yap aft eavrov irpbeiai, Kal ttjv iTnarpocpTjv iroirjaeTai trpbs 



168 THE ATHENIAN SCHOOL [CH. 

strive after nor attain its own good, and so would not be self- 
sufficing and perfect; but this belongs to the self-subsistent 
if to anything. Conversely, that which has the power of turn- 
ing back upon itself is self-subsistent. For thus to return, 
and to attain the end, is to find the source of its perfection, 
and therefore of its being, within itself. The self-subsistent is 
ungenerated. For generation is the way from imperfection to 
the opposite perfection 1 ; but that which produces itself is 
ever perfect, and needs not completion from another, like 
things that have birth. The self-subsistent is incorruptible, 
for it never departs from the cause of its preservation, which 
is itself. It is indivisible and simple. For if divisible, it cannot 
turn back, the whole to the whole ; and if composite, it must 
be in need of its own elements, of which it consists, and hence 
not self-sufficing. 

After some propositions on the everlasting or imperishable 
(atbiov) and the eternal (alcoviov), and on eternity and time, 
not specially distinctive of his system, Proclus goes on to a 
characteristic doctrine of his own, according to which the 
higher cause — which is also the more general — continues its 
activity beyond that of the causes that follow it. Thus the 
causal efficacy of the One extends as far as to Matter, in the 
production of which the intermediate causes, from intelligible 
being downwards, have no share. 

That which is produced by the things second in order, the 
series of propositions begins 2 , is produced in a higher degree by 
the things that are first in order and of more causal efficacy ; 
for the things that are second in order are themselves produced 
by the first, and derive their whole essence and causal efficacy 
from them. Thus intellect is the cause of all that soul is the 
cause of; and, where soul has ceased to energise, the intellect 
that produces it still continues its causal activity. For the 
inanimate, in so far as it participates in form, has part in 

eavr6. a(f> ov yap rj irpooBos e/cdcrrots, els tovto Kal y\ ttj irpoodcp <t6<ttolxos 

€Tl<XTpO(p7). 

1 2toix- ©eo\. 45 : Kal yap 77 yiveais 686s eariv 4k tov dreXovs els rb evavriov 
rikeiov. 

2 Srotx. GeoX. 56. 



IX] THE ATHENIAN SCHOOL 169 

intellect and the creative action of intellect 1 . Further, the 
Good is the cause of all that intellect is the cause of; but not 
conversely. For privations of form are from the Good, since 
all is thence, but intellect, being form, is not the ground of 
privation 2 . 

The product of more causes isjmore composite ( o-vvOercorepov) 
than the product of fewer. For if every cause gives something 
to that which proceeds from it, more causes must confer more 
elements and fewer fewer. Now where there are more elements 
of the composition, the resultant is said to be more composite; 
where there are fewer, less. Hence the simple in essence is 
either superior to things composite or inferior. For if the ex- 
tremes of being are produced by fewer concurrent causes and 
the means by more, the means must be composite while the 
extremes on both sides are simpler. But that the extremes are 
produced by fewer causes is evident, since the superior causes 
both begin to act before the inferior, and in their activity 
stretch out beyond the point where the activity of the latter 
ceases through remission of power (81 vfao-tv hwdfiecu^). 
Therefore the last of things, like the first, is most simple, 
because it proceeds only from the first; but, of these two 
simplicities, one is above all composition, the other below it. 

Of things that have plurality, that which is nearer the One 
is less in quantity than the more distant, greater in potency 3 . 
Consequently there are more corporeal natures than souls, 
more of these than of minds, more minds than divine henads. 

The more universal (6\t,Kcorepov) precedes in its causal 
action the more particular (/nepLKcorepov) and continues after 
it. Thus "being" comes before "living being" (f&W), and 
"living being" before "man," in the causal order as in the 
order of generality. Again, at a point below the agency of the 
rational power, where there is no longer "man," there is still 
a breathing and sentient living being; and where there is no 

1 Srotx- 9eo\. 57 : Kal yap to axj/vxov, KaObaov eiSous /iereirxe, vov juer^x" nal 
ttjs tov vov 7roii7<rews. 

2 Sroix. 6eo\. 57 : vovs 8e a-repr/aeM vTroo-T&T-qs ovk iariv, etdos wv. 

3 Srotx- ©eoX. 62 : 6/xocov yap r<3 evl /xaWov rb iyyvrepov ' rb 8e %v iravTwv rjv 
1/TrocTTaTt.Kbv aTrXrjdtjVTUs. 



170 THE ATHENIAN SCHOOL [CH. 

longer life there is still being. That which comes from the 
more universal causes is the bearer of that which is communi- 
cated in the remitting stages of the progression. Matter, 
which is at the extreme bound, has its subsistence only from 
the most universal cause, namely, the One. Being the subject 
of all things, it proceeded from the cause of all 1 . Body in 
itself, while it is below participation in soul, participates in a 
manner in being. As the subject of animation (vTroKeLfievov 
rrj? yjrvxcoa-ea^), it has its subsistence from that which is more 
universal than soul. 

Omitting some auxiliary propositions, we may go on to the 
doctrine of infinity as formulated by Proclus. In passing, it 
ma}^ be noted that he explicitly demonstrates the proposition 
that that which can know itself has the power of turning back 
upon itself. The reason assigned is that in the act of self- 
knowledge that which knows and that which is known are one. 
And what is true of the act is true also of the essence 2 . That 
only the incorporeal has the power of thus turning back upon 
itself was proved at an earlier stage. 

Infinity in the sense in which it really exists, with Proclus 
as with Plotinus, means infinite power or potency. That 
which ever is, is infinite in potency; for if its power of being 
(77 Kara rb elvai Svvcl/ms) were finite, its being would some 
time fail 3 . That which ever becomes, has an infinite power of 
becoming. For if the power is finite, it must cease in infinite 
time; and, the power ceasing, the process must cease. The 
real infinity of that which truly is, is neither of multitude nor 
of magnitude, but of potency alone 4 . For self-subsistent being 
(to avOvTTocrr dray? 6v) is indivisible and simple, and is in 
potency infinite as having most the form of unity (evoeihea- 
rarov) ; since the greatest causal power belongs to that which 
is nearest the One. The infinite in magnitude or multitude, 

1 2rot%. GeoX. 72 : i) fxev yap vXtj, vTroKeip.evov ovaa ttolvtuv, e/c tov iravTWv 
alriov irporfkde. 

2 Xtoix- GeoX. 83 : 7rav yap to rdj ivepyeiv wpbs iavrb i-marpeirTiKov /cat oxxriav 
e^ei 7rpos eavTyv avvveuovaav, /cat ev eavrrj ovirav. 

3 Srotx- 0eoX. 84. 

4 Xtoi-x- GeoX. S6 : Trap to ovtcos ov to? ovtl aireipov iari, o^Ve Kara, to TrXijdos 
oHt€ Kara to /J-cyedos, dXXd /cara ttjv dvvapi.iv pLovrjv. 



IX] THE ATHENIAN SCHOOL 171 

on the other hand, is at once most divided and weakest. In- 
divisible power is infinite and undivided in the same relation 
(Kara ravrov); the divided powers are in a manner finite 
(ireirepacryikvai ttojs) by reason of their division. From this 
sense of the finite, as limited power, is to be distinguished its 
sense as determinate number, by which it comes nearest to 
indivisible unity. 

That which is infinite, is infinite neither to the things above 
it nor to itself, but to the things that are inferior. To these, 
there is that in it which can by no means be grasped; it has 
what exceeds all the unfolding of its powers : but by itself, and 
still more by the things above it, it is held and defined as a 
whole 1 . 

We have already met with the position that in a complete 
causal series the first term is " imparticipable " (afiede/cTov). 
This means that in no way do the things it produces share it 
among them. The cause, thus imparticipable or transcendent, 
remains by itself in detachment from every succeeding stage. 
In drawing out the consequences of this position, Proclus 
introduces those intermediate terms which are held to be 
characteristic of his system. Within the Being or Intellect of 
the Plotinian Trinity, he constitutes the subordinate triad of 
being, life and mind. To these discriminated stages he applies 
his theory that causes descend in efficacy as they descend in 
generality. The series of things in which mind is immanent 
is preceded by imparticipable mind; similarly life and being 
precede the things that participate in them; but of these 
being is before life, life before mind 2 . In the order of depen- 
dence, the cause of more things precedes the cause of fewer. 
Now all things have being that have life, and all things have 
life that have mind, but not conversely. Hence in the causal 
order being must come first, then life, then mind. All are in 

1 2roix« QeoK. 93 : eavrb de crvv^xov koX bpl^ov ovk av iavT<2 aireipov VTrdpxot, 
ovde ttoWu) fxaWov rots virepneiixtvois, ixoipav %x ov T7 )s & ixeivois aVetp/as * aireipo- 
repat yap at tQ>v bXiKUT^puv 8vvd/j.e<.s, oXiKd/repai oucrat /cat iyyvTepa) Teray/xeuai 
tt)s irpwTiaTrjs aireLpias. 

2 "Ztoix- GeoX. 101 : iravriov tQv vov fxerexovTuv rjye'iTCU 6 dfiedeKros vovs, /cat 
tGjv ttjs far)? i) £a»7, /cat tu>v tov ovtos t6 6v ' avruiv 5e tovtwv to fih ov irpb rrjs 
jV>7S, 7) 5e far} irpb tov vov. 



172 THE ATHENIAN SCHOOL [CH. 

all; but in each each is present in the manner appropriate to 
the subsistence of that in which it inheres 1 . 

All that is immortal is imperishable, but not all that is 
imperishable is immortal. For that which ever participates 
in life participates also in being, but not conversely. As 
being is to life, so is the imperishable, or that which cannot 
cease to be, to the immortal, or that which cannot cease to 
live 2 . Since that which is altogether in time is in every 
respect unlike that which is altogether eternal, there must 
be something between them; for the causal progression is 
always through similars 3 . This mean must be eternal in 
essence, temporal in act. Generation, which has its essence 
in time, is attached causally to that which on one side shares 
in being and on the other in birth, participating at once in 
eternity and in time; this, to that which is altogether eternal; 
and that which is altogether eternal to being before eternity 
(et<? to ov, to 7rpoat(ovLov) 4: . 

The highest terms of each causal chain (aeipd), and only 
those, are connected with the unitary principle of the chain 
next above. Thus only the highest minds are directly attached 
to a divine unity; only the most intellectual souls participate 
in mind ; and only the most perfect corporeal natures have a 
soul present to them 5 . Above all divine unities is the One, 
which is God; as it must be, since it is the Good; for that 
beyond which there is nothing, and after which all things 
strive, is God 6 . But that there must also be many divine 
unities is evident, since every cause which is a principle takes 
the lead in a series of multiplied existences descending from 
itself by degrees of likeness. The self-complete unities (clvto- 
TeXet? evdSes) or "divine henads," are "the gods," and every 

1 ~Ltoix> OeoX. 103 : -rravra iv xacnv ' ot'/ceia/s de ev eicacrTip. As for example, 4v 
ttj fafj Kara fxtde^iv jxh to etVat, /car' alriav 5e to voeiv ' aXXa ^"wrt/cws exaTepov • 
/caret tovto yap 7) virap^is. 

2 2roix. OeoX. 105. 

3 Stoix. 6eoX. 106 : at irpboboi irda-ai 8td tQv 6/u.olwv. 4 Ztolx- ©eoX. 107. 

5 ST0i%. 6eoX. 111. Cf. 112: iraarjs rdfews tcl TrpwricrTa fJLop<pi]v #xet tuv trpb 
atiTuv. 

6 Srotx. 6eoX. 113: ov yap p.7)dev k(TTiv eiriKeiva, /cat ov ir&VTa ecpieTai, debs 

TOVTO. 



IX] THE ATHENIAN SCHOOL 173 

god is above being and life and mind 1 . In all there is partici- 
pation, except in the One 2 . 

Much has been written upon the question, what the henads 
of Proclus really mean. Usually the doctrine is treated as an 
attempt to find a more definite place for polytheism than was 
marked out in the system of Plotinus. This explanation, 
however, is obviously inadequate, and there have not been 
wanting attempts to find in it a more philosophical meaning. 
Now so far as the origin of the doctrine is concerned, it seems 
to be a perfectly consequent development from Plotinus. 
Proclus seeks the cause of plurality in things at a higher stage 
than the intelligible world, in which Plotinus had been con- 
tent to find its beginning. Before being and mind are pro- 
duced, the One acts as it were through many points of origin; 
from each of these start many minds; each of which again 
is the principle of further differences. As the primal unity 
is called 0eo?, the derivative unities are in correspondence 
called 6eoi. Thus the doctrine is pure deductive metaphysics. 
There is hardly any indication that in thinking it out Proclus 
had in view special laws of nature or groups of natural facts 3 . 
Though not otherwise closely resembling Spinoza's doctrine of 
the "infinite attributes," it resembles it in this, that it is a 
metaphysical deduction intended to give logical completeness, 
where intuitive completeness becomes impossible, to a system 
of pure conceptual truth. 

From the divine henads, according to Proclus, the provi- 
dential order of the world directly descends. This position he 
supports by a fanciful etymology 4 , but deduces essentially 
from the priority of goodness as characterising the divinity 5 . 

1 2roiX' OeoX. 115: iras debs xnrepoiaibs iart /cat vxepfaos Kal viripvovs. 

2 Sroix- Qeo\. 116: was debs fiedeKrbs iari, 7rXV rod evbs....el yap 'e'ariv &Wtj 
perd to irpS>Tov d/j.e'deKTOs evds, tl dtoiaec rod evbs; 

3 A slight development on this line is to be met with in §§ 151-8, but not 
such as to affect the general aspect of the doctrine. 

4 Sroix« ©eoX. 120: ev deols i] irpovoia irpwrus '...■}} 8e irpbvoia (Cos Totivo/xa 
ifi(f>aiv€i) evepyetd ecTi irpb vov. ry elvat. &pa deol Kal T(p dyadbrrjTes etvai ttolvtuv 
Trpovoovai, iravra rrjs irpb vov TrXripovvTes dyadbr-qros. 

5 Stoix* Qeo\. 121 : irdv to delov virap^iv fxev ^x €L T V dyadbTrjra, dtivapuv 8e 

eviaiav Kal yvCociv Kpti<piov, cLXtjittov irdo~iv bfiov toTs bevrepois dXX' tj virap^is 

t$ dpiaTip xapct/CT77/)t^eTai, Kal i) VTrbcTatns Kara to &pi<XTOV' tovto 8e tj dyadoT7]S' 



174 THE ATHENIAN SCHOOL [CH. 

After goodness come power and knowledge. The divine know- 
ledge is above intellect; and the providential government of 
the world is not by a reasoning process (ov Kara Xoyiafxov). By 
nothing that comes after it can the divinity in itself either be 
expressed or known. Since, however, it is knowable as henads 
from the things that participate in them, only the primal One 
is entirely unknowable, as not being participated in 1 . The 
divinity knows indivisibly the things that are divided, and 
without time the things that are in time, and the things that 
are not necessary with necessity, and the things that are 
mutable immutably; and, in sum, all things better than ac- 
cording to their own order. Its knowledge of the multiple and 
of things subject to passion is unitary and without passivity. 
On the other hand, that which is below has to receive the 
impassible with passive affection, and the timeless under the 
form of time 2 . 

The order of the divine henads is graduated; some being 
more universal, some more particular. The causal efficacy of 
the former is greater; of the latter, less. The more particular 
divine henads are generated from the more universal, neither 
by division of these nor by alteration, nor yet by manifold 
relationships, but by the production of secondary progressions 
through superabundance of power 3 . The divine henad first 
communicates its power to mind; through mind, it is present 
to soul; and through soul it gives a resonance of its own 
peculiar nature even to body. Thus body becomes not only 
animate and intelligential, but also divine, receiving life and 
motion from soul, indissoluble permanence from mind, divine 
union from the henad participated in 4 . Not all the other 
henads together are equal to the primal One 5 . There are as 
many kinds of beings that participate in the divine henads as 
there are henads participated in. The more universal henads 
are participated in by the more universal kinds of beings ; the 
more particular by the more particular. Thus the order of 

1 Utolx- Qeok. 123: fibvov to irpurov iravTeXojs dyvunrrou, are dfiideKTov 6v. 

2 Srot X . Oeo\. 124. 3 Srotx- Oeo\. 126. 4 Srotx- 6eo\. 129. 
5 Srotx- OeoX. 133 : ov yap at iracrai tQv de£)i> virap^eis irapwovvTai rtp ivi ' 

ToaauTTjv ineivo irpbs to Tr\r)dos tQv de&v tzXaxw virep^oX-qv. 



IX] THE ATHENIAN SCHOOL 175 

beings is in precise accordance with the order of the henads. 
Each being has for its cause not only the henad in which it 
participates, but, along with that, the primal One 1 . 

All the powers of the divinity penetrate even to the terres- 
trial regions, being excluded by no limits of space from pres- 
ence to all that is ready for participation 2 . Beside that provi- 
dence of the gods which is outside and above the order over 
which it is exercised, there is another, imitating it within the 
order and exercised over the things that are at a lower stage 
of remission by those that are higher in the causal series 3 . 
The gods are present in the same manner to all things, but not 
all things are present in the same manner to the gods. It is 
unfitness of the things participating that causes obscuration 
of the divine presence. Total deprivation of it would mean 
their complete disappearance into not-being. At each stage 
of remission, the divinity is present, not only in the manner 
peculiar to each causal order, but in the manner appropriate 
to the particular stage. The progressions have the form of a 
circle; the end being made like the beginning through the 
return of all things within the order to its principle 4 . 

The whole multitude of the divine henads is finite in num- 
ber. It is indeed more definitely limited than any other 
multitude, as being nearest to the One. Infinite multitude, 
on the other hand, is most remote from the One 5 . There is 
at the same time, as has been shown, a sense in which all 
divine things are infinite. That is to say, they are infinite in 
potency, and incomprehensible to what is below them 6 . 

The henads participated in by being which is prior to 
intellect are intelligible (vorjrai); those that are participated 
in by intellect itself are intelligential (voepai), as producing 

1 Stoix- 6eo\. 137 : 7rdcra ivas <rvvv(pi(XTr]<Tt t<$ evl to /xerixov avrijs 6v. 

2 Sroix- OeoX. 140. 3 Ztoi X . 6«>\. 141. 

4 Sroix- ©eo\. 146. Cf. 148: iraira deia rd£ts eavrfj (rvv-qvurai t/hx&s" airb re 

TTJS &Kp6T7}TOS TTJS ia.VT7]S KOLl o\tTO T7JS pLCCT OTTJT OS , KCU aiTO TOU riXoVS. . . .KCil OUTWS 6 

cvfiTras 5i&KO<Tfios els 4<ttl 8ia ttjs evoiroiov t&v vpwT&v dvvafiews, 5ta ttjs kv t 
/j.€o-6t7iti. <rvi>oxv$, &a ttjs tou t4\ovs el's tt)v dpxv v T ^ v irpoodwv e7TKrrpo0^s. 

5 Sroix- OeoK. 149. 

6 2roix- ©eoX. 150 : i] Be a-rreipia Kara rr\v dtvapuv iKeivois ' to de aireipov 
aw epiKyjiTTOv, ols icmv direipov. 



176 THE ATHENIAN SCHOOL [CH. 

intelligence 1 ; those that are participated in by soul are supra- 
mundane (virepKoa-fiLot). As soul is attached to intellect, and 
intellect turns back upon intelligible being; so the supramun- 
dane gods depend on the intelligential, as those again on the 
intelligible gods 2 . Something also of visible bodies being from 
the gods, there are also " mundane henads " (iyfc6o-/j,ioL evdSes). 
These are mediated by mind and soul; which, according as 
they are more separable from the world and its divided con- 
tents, have more resemblance to the imparticipable 3 . 

Having dealt so far with the ontology of intellect, Proclus 
goes on to formulate the characters of intellectual knowledge. 
Intellect has itself for the object of its thought 4 . Mind in act 
knows that it thinks; and it does not belong to one mind to 
think an object and to another to think the thought of the 
object 5 . The thought, the knowledge of the thought, and the 
cognisance of itself as thinking, are simultaneous activities of 
one subject. It is the character of mind to think all things 
together. Imparticipable mind thinks all of them together 
simply; each mind that follows thinks them all still together, 
but under the form of the singular 6 . That mind is incorporeal 
is shown by its turning back upon itself 7 . In accordance with 
its being, it contains all things intellectually, both those before 
it and those after it; the former by participation, the latter by 
containing their causes intellectually 8 . 

Mind constitutes what is after it by thinking; and its crea- 

1 2rotx- ©eoX. 163 : oi>x ovtu voepal, us ev vo) v<peo~T7)Kviai, dXX' us /car' afriav 
tov vov irpovirdpxovaai, Kal aTroyevvirjo'aaaL tov vovv. 

2 Srotx. 0eo\. 164 : us ovv rpvxv Trdaa els vovv av-qpr-qrat, Kal vovs els to votjtov 
iTreo~TpcnrTai, ovtu by Kal 61 virepKbcrpaoL deol tuv voepuv e^xovTai, Kaddirep bij 
Kai 0VT01 TUV voirruv. 

3 Sroix- 6eo\. 166. 

4 Srotx. OeoX. 167. 

5 Sroix- OeoX. 168 : iras vovs Ka^ ivipyeiav otbev, oti voei, Kal ovk aWov p.ev 
tbiov tl voetv, SXKov be to voelv, oti voei. 

6 Sroix- GeoX. 170 : iras vovs iravTa dixa voei' dXX' 6 fiev d/ze'tfe/cTos dirXus 
ir&vTa, tuv be ^er' eKeivov e/cacrros Ka6' eV airavTa. Cf. 180. 

7 2roix. OeoX. 171 : on p.ev odv ao~up.aTos 6 vovs, rj irpbs eavTbv eirio-Tpo<j>r) 
5r)\ol' tuv yap o~up.aTuv ovbev Trpbs eavrb eirio~Tpe'<p'eTai. 

8 Srotx* OeoX. 173 : to be elvai avrov voepbv, Kal to. atTta dpa voepus e%et tuv 
tt&vtwv ' uo~re iravra voepus £x €t 7ro ' s vovs, Kal to. irpb ai>T0v, Kal to. p.eT J avrbv ' us 
ovv to. vorjrd voepus e%ei. Trds vovs, ovtu Kal to. aiad-qTa voepus. 



IX] THE ATHENIAN SCHOOL 177 

tion is in thinking, and its thought in creating 1 . It is first 
participated in by the things which, although their thought is 
according to the temporal and not according to the eternal 
order, which is timeless, yet have the power of thinking and 
actually think during the whole of time. That such existences 
should be interposed before particular souls, is required by the 
graduated mediation characteristic of every causal progres- 
sion 2 . Soul that is sometimes thinking and sometimes not, 
cannot participate without mediation in eternal mind. 

The intellectual forms in mind are both in one another and 
each for itself without either spatial interval or confusion. 
This Proclus demonstrates from the nature of indivisible 
essence. If any one needs an analogy as well as a demon- 
stration, then, he says, there is the case of the various theorems 
existing in one soul. The soul draws forth the propositions 
that constitute its knowledge, not by pulling them apart from 
one another, but by making separately clear to itself implicit 
distinctions that already exist 3 . The minds that contain more 
universal forms are superior in causal efficacy to those that 
contain more particular forms. The first by forms that are 
quantitatively less produce more effects ; the second fewer by 
forms that are quantitatively more. From the second proceed 
the finer differences of kinds 4 . The products of intellectual 
forms are imperishable. Kinds that are only for a time do not 
subsist from a formal or ideal cause of their own; nor have 
perishable things, as such, a pre-existent intellectual form 5 . 
The number of minds is finite 6 . Every mind is a whole; and 
each is at once united with other minds and discriminated 

1 2rotx. GeoX. 174: iras vovs ry voeiv v<plffTrj<ri rd /xer' avrdv, /cat tj TTo'n\<ns ev 
ry voeiv, /cat i) vor}<ns ev t£ iroteiv. 

2 2toi%. 0eo\. 175: ov5a/j,ou yap at irpoodoi yivovrai dfieaws, dXXa 5td twv 
cvyyevCov /cat 6fAoiu>v, Kara re ras viroardo-ecs /cat ras tQjv ivepyeiwv reXetoY^Tay. 

3 2rot%. 0eoX. 176 : iravra yap eiXt/coti/cDs i] ^vxv irpodyet., /cat X^pis eKao~TOv, 
/xrjdev ecp&Kovaa dirb tuv Xoittuv, a (el fii) o'te/ce'/coiTO del Kara ttjv k^iv) ou5' hv i] 
evipyeia diinpive ttjs fax?}*. 

4 2rot%. GeoX. 177 : oBev ol deijrepoi vdes rah tGiv el5<2v jueot/cwre'pais Sta/cptVecrti' 
iTidiapOpovcri ttus /cat XeirTovpyovai ras t&v irpdiruv elbotrodas. 

5 2rot%. GeoX. 178: irdv voepbv eldos di'di&v earlv viroaraTLKov oUre dpa rd 

ytvt) rd Kara riva x? ovov & 71 "' atrtas vcpkaTrjKev eldrjTiKrjs, oiire ret (pdaprd, y 
<t>daprd, eldos ex« voepbv Trpovirdpxov. 6 2rotx- GeoX. 179. 

w. 12 



178 THE ATHENIAN SCHOOL [CH. 

from them. Imparticipable mind is a whole simply, since it 
has in itself all the parts under the form of the whole; of the 
partial minds each contains the whole as in a part 1 . 

The mean between divine imparticipable mind and mind 
participated in and intelligential but not divine, is divine 
mind participated in. In this participate divine souls. Of 
souls there are three kinds : first, those that are divine ; 
second, those that are not divine but that always participate 
in intelligible mind; third, those that change between mind 
and deprivation of it. Every soul is an incorporeal essence and 
separable from the body 2 . For since it knows that which is 
above it, namely, mind and intellectual things in their purity, 
much more is it the nature of the soul to know itself. Now 
that which knows itself turns back upon itself. And that 
which turns back upon itself is neither body nor inseparable 
from body; for the mere turning back upon itself, of which 
body is incapable, necessitates separability. Every soul is 
indestructible and incorruptible. For everything that can in 
any way be dissolved and destroyed is either corporeal and 
composite or has its existence in a subject. That which is 
dissolved undergoes corruption as consisting of a multitude 
of divisible parts; that of which it is the nature to exist in 
another, being separated from its subject vanishes into not- 
being. But the soul comes under neither of these determina- 
tions ; existent as it is in the act of turning back upon itself. 
Hence it is indestructible and incorruptible. 

Proclus now goes on to define more exactly the characters 
of the soul in relation to things prior and posterior to it. It 
is self-subsistent and is the principle of life to itself and to 
all that participates in it. As it is a mean between things 
primarily indivisible and those that have the divisibility be- 
longing to body, so also it is a mean between things wholly 
eternal and those that are wholly temporal. Eternal in essence 
and temporal in act, it is the first of things that have part in 
the world of generation. In the logical order of causes, it 

1 2rotx- 'Q*o\. 180: d\\' 6 fiev a/JLedenros vovs airXQs o\os, ws ra fxipr} iravra. 
oXikQs fyiav ev eavrqi, tuiv 5e /xepiK&v e/cacrros ws ev /xepei to 8\ov £x et - Cf. 170. 

2 2-ronc. eeo\. 186. 



IX] THE ATHENIAN SCHOOL 179 

comes next after mind, and contains all the intellectual forms 
that mind possesses primarily. These it has by participation, 
and as products of the things before it. Things perceptible 
it anticipates in their pre-formed models (TrapaSeiy/jLaTi/coos). 
Thus it holds the reasons of things material immaterially, and 
of corporeal things incorporeally, and of things apart in space 
without spatially separating them. Things intelligible, on the 
other hand, it receives in their expression by images (el/covi- 
tcm); divisibly the forms of those that are undivided, by 
multiplication the forms of those that are unitary, by self- 
motion the forms of those that are unmoved 1 . 

Every soul participated in has for its first organ an im- 
perishable body, ungenerated and incorruptible. For if every 
soul is imperishable in essence and primarily animates some- 
thing corporeal, then, since its being is immutable, it animates 
it always. If that which has soul has it always, it also par- 
ticipates ever in the life of soul 2 . But that which is ever 
living ever is, that is to say, is imperishable 3 . 

All that participates in time yet is perpetually moved, is 
measured by circuits. For since things are determinate both in 
multitude and in magnitude, transition cannot go on through 
different collocations to infinity. On the other hand, the tran- 
sitions of that which is ever moved can have no term. They 
must therefore go from the same to the same ; the time of the 
circuit furnishing the measure of the motion. Every mundane 
soul, since it passes without limit through transitions of which 
time is the measure, has circuits of its proper life, and restitu- 
tions to its former position 4 . While other souls have some 
particular time for the measure of their circuit, the circuit of 

1 Stoix- OeoX. 195. Cf. Arist. De An. iii. 8, 431 b 21 : i] tyvxh to. ovra 7rws 
i<TTi iravra. 

2 STOt%. QeoX. 196 : el de tovto to \pvxov[xevov del \}/vxovtcu, /ecu aet /j.eTex €L 
far}?. 

3 The chief propositions on the imperishable vehicle of the soul are to be 
found near the end of the treatise (207-10). The substance of them is that, 
in the descent and reascent of the particular soul, extraneous material 
clothings are in turn put upon the vehicle and stripped off from it; the 
vehicle itself remaining impassible. 

4 Stoix- ©eo\. 199: irdixa rf/vxr] iyKotr/xios 7repi65ois XPV TaL T V* oUeias far)s 
Kal airoKaTacrTacreaiv . . . .wdcra yap wepiodos r<2v a'Cd'uav diroKaraaTaTiK-q 4<tti. 

12—2 



180 THE ATHENIAN SCHOOL [CH. 

the first soul measured by time coincides with the whole of 
time 1 . 

With greater distance of souls from the One there goes, 
according to the general principle already set forth, increase 
of number and diminution of causal efficacy 2 . Every par- 
ticular soul may descend to birth infinite times and reascend 
from birth to being. For it now follows after the divine and 
now falls away; and such alternation must evidently be re- 
current. The soul cannot be an infinite time among the gods, 
and then the whole succeeding time among bodies; for that 
which has no temporal beginning can never have an end, and 
that which has no end necessarily has no beginning 3 . 

Every particular soul, descending to birth, descends as a 
whole. It does not partly remain above and partly descend. 
For if part of the soul remains in the intelligible world, it must 
either think ever without transition, or by a transitive pro- 
cess. But if without transition, then it thinks as pure intellect, 
and not as a part of the soul; and so must be the soul im- 
mediately participating in mind, that is, the general soul. If 
it thinks by a transitive process, then, out of that which is 
always thinking and that which sometimes thinks one essence 
is composed. But this also is impossible. Besides, it is absurd 
that the highest part of the soul, being, as it is if it does not 
descend, ever perfect, should not rule the other powers and 
make them also perfect. Every particular soul therefore 
descends as a whole 4 . 

3. The End of the Platonic Succession. 

Of the successors to Plato's chair after Proclus, the most 
noteworthy was Damascius, the last of all. A native of 
Damascus, he had studied at Alexandria and at Athens. 
Among his teachers was Marinus, the immediate successor 
and the biographer of Proclus. The skill in dialectic for which 
he was celebrated, he himself attributed to the instructions 

1 Ztoix. ©eoX. 200. 2 Sroix- ©eoX. 203. 

3 2toix. 6eoX. 206 : Xei7rerai &pa irepi68ovs eKdcTrjv iroieurdai, dvdSwv re etc rrjs 
yevtcews Kal t&v et's yiveaiv Kad68iov, Kal tovto dwavaTov elvai did rbv dveipou 
Xp6vov. €K&<ttt) dpa \f/vxv /J-epiKT] Karievcu re iir direipov bivarai /cat dvUvai. Kal 
tovto ov p.7) TraiJcreTai irepl airdcas to Trdd7]/xa yevofxevov. 4 2roiX- 6eoX. 211. 



IX] THE ATHENIAN SCHOOL 181 

of Isidore, his predecessor in the chair, whose biography he 
wrote 1 . In an extensive work on First Principles (AiropLaL 
teal \vo-eis irepl raiv 7rpcorcov apx&v) 2 , he maintained with the 
utmost elaboration that the principle of things is unknowable. 
This we have met with as a general position in Proclus 3 ; and 
it is already laid down distinctly by Plotinus, who says for 
example that we can learn by intellect that the One is, but not 
what it is. Even to call it the One is rather to deny of it 
plurality than to assert any truth regarding it that can be 
grasped by the intelligence 4 . Still, with Plotinus and Proclus, 
this is more a recognition of the inadequacy of all forms of 
thought to convey true knowledge of the principle which is the 
source of thought, than a doctrine standing out by itself as the 
last word of their philosophy. Damascius on the other hand 
seems to exhaust human language in the effort to make plain 
how absolutely unknowable the principle is 5 . Thus his doc- 
trine has the effect of a new departure, and presents itself as 
the most definitely agnostic phase of ancient metaphysics. 
Zeller treats this renunciation of all knowledge of the principle 
as a symptom of the exhaustion of Greek philosophy ; a view 
which perhaps, at certain points of time, would not have 
allowed us to hope much more from modern philosophy. The 
ancient schools, however, did not die till a final blow was 
struck at them on behalf of the spiritual authority that now 
ruled the world. 

It may be read in Gibbon how the Emperor Justinian (527 
-565), while he directed the codification of the Roman law, 
succeeded in effacing in considerable measure the record of 
stages of jurisprudence less conformable to the later imperial 

1 The fragments of this, preserved by Photius, are printed in the appendix 
to the Didot edition of Diogenes Laertius. 

2 About half of this work was edited by Kopp in 1826; the whole by Ruelle 
in 1889. In 1898 was published a complete French translation by M. Chaignet 
in three volumes. 3 Sroix- OeoX. 123. 

4 Enn. V. 5, 6 : to de olov o-r]p.aivoL av to oi>x olov ' ov yap Hvl ov$e to olov, 8tu) 
fir/de t6 Tt....rax<x de kclI r6 £v 6vop.a tovto apenv ^x ei irpbs to. TroWd, 86ev /ecu 
' AirdWiova ol Ii.vdayopi.Kol o~v/jlj3o\lkCos irpbs dM^Xoiij 4arjp.ai.vou airo(pao~€i tCov 
ttoWQv. 

5 Cf. R. P. 545: Kai rl 7repas &rrcu tov \6yov ttXtjv <r<.yr)s ap.t\x&vov Kal 6p,o- 
Xoyias tov p.rj8ev yivdjCKetv uv p.T]8e dip.is, aovvaruv ovtuv els yvQcriv e\dew; 



182 THE ATHENIAN SCHOOL [CH. 

absolutism. To make that absolutism unbroken even in name, 
he afterwards suppressed the Roman Consulship, which had 
gone on till his time. Before the completion of his Code — the 
great positive achievement to which he owes his fame — he had 
already promulgated a decree for securing uniformity in the 
spiritual sphere. So far, in spite of the formal prohibition of 
the ancient religion, the philosophers at Athens had retained 
some freedom to oppose Christian positions on speculative 
questions. This seems clear from the fact that Proclus had 
been able to issue a tractate in which he set forth the argu- 
ments for the perpetuity of the world against the Christian 
doctrine of creation 1 . Justinian, who was desirous of a repu- 
tation for strictness of orthodoxy, resolved that even this 
freedom should cease; and in 529 he enacted that henceforth 
no one should teach the ancient philosophy. In the previous 
year, when there was a "great persecution of the Greeks" 
(that is, of all who showed attachment to the ancient religion), 
it had been made a law that those who "Hellenised" should 
be incapable of holding offices. Suppression of the philo- 
sophical lectures was accompanied by confiscation of the en- 
dowments of the school. And these were private endowments ; 
the public payments to the occupants of the chairs having 
long ceased 2 . The liberty of philosophising was now every- 
where brought within the limits prescribed by the Christian 
Church. Not till the dawn of modern Europe was a larger 
freedom to be reassumed; and not even then without peril. 

The narrative of the historian Agathias (fl. 570) is well 
known, how Damascius, Simplicius, Eulalius, Priscianus, Her- 
mias, Diogenes and Isidorus departed from Athens for Persia, 
having been invited by King Chosroes (Khosru Nushirvan), 
and hoping to find in the East an ideal kingdom and a philo- 
sophic king 3 . Though Chosroes himself was not without a real 
interest in philosophy, as he showed by the translations he 
caused to be made of Platonic and Aristotelian writings, their 

1 A reply to the , Einx^i-PVf J -0' Ta Kara Xpio-riavQiv of Proclus was written by 
Joannes Philoponus, in the form of a lengthy work (included in the Teubner 
Series, 1899) bearing the title De Aeternitate Mundi. 

2 See, for the evidence as to the exact circumstances of the suppression, 
Zeller, iii. 2, pp. 849-50, with notes. Cf. R. P. 547 c. 3 E. P. 547. 



IX] THE ATHENIAN SCHOOL 183 

expectations were thoroughly disappointed. They found that 
the genuine unmodified East was worse than the Roman 
Empire in its decline. At length they entreated to return to 
their own country under any conditions ; and Chosroes, though 
pressing them to stay, not only allowed them to go, but in a 
special clause of a treaty of peace with Justinian, stipulated 
that they should not be constrained to forsake their own 
opinions, but should retain their freedom while they lived. This 
was in 533. The date of their voluntary exile was probably 532. 
After their return, as has been already indicated, the 
philosophers devoted themselves to the writing of learned 
commentaries. The most illustrious of the commentators was 
Simplicius, whose works on Aristotle's Categories, Physics, De 
Caelo and De Anima, and on the Encheiridion of Epictetus, 
are extant. Even this last period was not marked by complete 
inability to enter on a new path. What the speculative ex- 
haustion animadverted on by Zeller really led to was a return 
to the most positive kind of knowledge that then seemed 
attainable. Aristotle now came to be studied with renewed 
zeal; and it was in fact by a tradition from the very close of 
antiquity that he afterwards acquired his predominant au- 
thority, first among the Arabians and then among the school- 
men of the West 1 . The last Neo-Platonists thus had the merit 
of comprehending his unapproached greatness as the master 
in antiquity of all human and natural knowledge. If to some 
extent they were wrong in trying to prove his thoroughgoing 
agreement with Plato, their view was at any rate nearer the 
mark than that which makes the two philosophers types of 
opposition. The most recent students of Plato would perfectly 
agree with one at least of the distinctions by which Simplicius 
reconciles apparently conflicting positions. When Plato, he 
says, describes the world as having come to be, he means that 
it proceeds from a higher cause ; when Aristotle describes it as 
not having become, he means that it has no beginning in 
time 2 . Apart from learned research, subtleties may still be 
found in the commentators that had never before been ex- 

1 Cf. Renan, Averroes et V Averroisme, pp. 92-3. 

2 Zeller, iii. 2, p. 846. Cf . Archer-Hind, The Timaeus of Plato. 



184 THE ATHENIAN SCHOOL [CH. IX 

pressed with such precision. For the rest, they are themselves 
as conscious of the decline as their modern critics. What they 
actually did was in truth all that was possible, and the very 
thing that was needed, in their own age. 

To the latest period, as was said at the beginning of the 
chapter, belong the names of several Alexandrian teachers. 
Among these are Hermias, the pupil of Syrianus; Ammonius, 
the son of Hermias and the pupil of Proclus 1 ; Asclepiodotus, 
a physician, who, according to Damascius, surpassed all his 
contemporaries in knowledge of mathematics and natural 
science; ancL Olympiodorus, a pupil of Ammonius and the 
last teacher of the Platonic philosophy whose name has been 
preserved. Commentaries by Hermias and Ammonius, as well 
as by Olympiodorus, are still extant. 

An exhaustive history of Neo-Platonism would find in the 
writings of the Athenian school materials especially abundant. 
Much has been printed, though many works still remain un- 
published. In the present chapter, only a very general account 
is attempted 2 . The object, here as elsewhere, has been to bring 
out the essential originality of the Neo-Platonic movement ; 
not to trace minutely the various currents that contributed to 
its formation and those into which it afterwards diverged as it 
passed into later systems of culture. To follow, " per incertam 
lunam sub luce maligna," the exact ways by which it modified 
the culture of mediaeval Europe, would be a work of research 
for a separate volume. The general direction, however, and its 
principal stages, are sufficiently clear; and some attempt will 
be made in the next chapter to trace first the continued 
influence of Neo-Platonism in the Middle Ages, and then its 
renewed influence at the Renaissance and in modern times. 
For the earliest period — for the unmistakably "dark ages" of 
the West — the transmission was in great part through Christian 
writers, who,living at the close of the ancient world, had received 
instruction as pupils in the still surviving philosophic schools. 

1 Joannes Philoponus (fl. 530), the Christian commentator on Aristotle, 
had Ammonius for his teacher, and quotes him as "the philosopher." See 
Zeller, iii. 2, p. 829, n. 4. 

2 This is now supplemented by an account of the Commentaries of Proclus; 
for which see the end of the volume. 



CHAPTER X 

THE INFLUENCE OF NEO-PLATONISM 

The influence of Neo-Platonism on the official Christian philo- 
sophy of the succeeding period was mainly in the department 
of psychology. Biblical psychology by itself did not of course 
fix any determinate scientific view. Its literal interpretation 
might seem, if anything, favourable to a kind of materialism 
combined with supernaturalism, like that of Tertullian. Even 
the Pauline conception of "spirit," regarded at once as an in- 
fusion of Deity and as the highest part of the human soul, lent 
itself quite easily to a doctrine like that of the Stoics, which 
identified the divine principle in the world with the corporeal 
element most remote by its lightness and mobility from gross 
matter. For a system, however, that was to claim on behalf 
of its supernatural dogmas a certain justification by human 
reason as a preliminary condition to their full reception by 
faith, the idea of purely immaterial soul and mind was evi- 
dently better adapted. This conception, taken over for the 
practical purposes of the Church in the scientific form given 
to it by the Neo-Platonists, has accordingly maintained its 
ground ever since. The occasional attempts in modern times 
by sincerely orthodox Christians to fall back upon an exclusive 
belief in the resurrection of the body, interpreted in a materi- 
alistic sense, as against the heathen doctrine of the natural 
immortality of the soul, have never gained any appreciable 
following. At the end of the ancient world Platonic idealism, 
so far as it was compatible with the dualism necessitated by 
certain portions of the dogmatic system, was decisively 
adopted. In the East, Greek ecclesiastical writers such as 
Nemesius (fl. 450), who had derived their culture from Neo- 
Platonism, transmitted its refutations of materialism to the 
next age. In the West, St Augustine, who, as is known, was 
profoundly influenced by Platonism, and who had read Plo- 
tinus in a Latin translation, performed the same philosophical 



186 THE INFLUENCE [CH. 

service. The great positive result was to familiarise the Euro- 
pean mind with the elements of certain metaphysical con- 
ceptions elaborated by the latest school of independent philo- 
sophy. When the time came for renewed independence, long 
practice with abstractions had made it easier than it had ever 
hitherto been — difficult as it still was — to set out in the pur- 
suit of philosophic truth from a primarily subjective point of 
view. 

It was long, however, before Western Europe could even 
begin to fashion for itself new instruments by provisionally 
working within the prescribed circle of revealed dogma and 
subordinated philosophy. The very beginning of Scholasticism 
is divided by a gulf of more than three centuries from the end 
of Neo-Platonism ; and not for about two centuries more did 
this lead to any continuous intellectual movement. In the 
meantime, the elements of culture that remained had been 
transmitted by Neo-Platonists or writers influenced by them. 
An especially important position in this respect is held by 
Boethius, who was born at Rome about 480, was Consul in 
510, and was executed by order of Theodoric in 524. In philo- 
sophy Boethius represents an eclectic Neo-Platonism turned 
to ethical account. His translation of Porphyry's logical work 
has already been mentioned. He also devoted works of his 
own to the exposition of Aristotle's logic. It was when he had 
fallen into disgrace with Theodoric that he wrote the De Con- 
solatione Philosophiae; and the remarkable fact has often been 
noticed that, although certainly a nominal Christian, he 
turned in adversity wholly to heathen philosophy, not making 
the slightest allusion anywhere to the Christian revelation. 
The vogue of the De Consolatione in the Middle Ages is equally 
noteworthy. Rulers like Alfred, eagerly desirous of spreading 
all the light that was accessible, seem to have been drawn by 
a secret instinct to the work of a man of kindred race, who, 
though at the extreme bound, had still been in living contact 
with the indigenous culture of the old European world. An- 
other work much read in the same period was the commentary 
of Macrobius (fl. 400) on the S omnium Scipionis extracted 
from Cicero's De Republica. Macrobius seems not to have 



X] OF NEOPLATONISM 187 

been even a nominal Christian. He quotes Neo-Platonist 
writers, and, by the impress he has received from their type 
of thinking, furnishes evidence of the knowledge there was of 
them in the West. 

In the East some influence on theological metaphysics was 
exercised by Synesius, the friend of Hypatia. Having become 
a Christian, Synesius unwillingly allowed himself to be made 
Bishop of Ptolemais (about 410) ; seeking to reserve the philo- 
sophical liberty to treat portions of popular Christianity as 
mythical, but not quite convinced that this was compatible 
with the episcopal office. A deeper influence of the same kind, 
extending to the West, came from the works of the writer 
known under the name of that "Dionysius the Areopagite" 
who is mentioned among the converts of St Paul at Athens 
(Acts xvii. 34). As no incontestable reference to those w r orks 
is found till the sixth century, and as they are characterised by 
ideas distinctive of the school of Proclus, it is now held that 
they proceeded from some Christian Platonist trained in the 
Athenian school. It is possible indeed that the real Dionysius 
had been a hearer of Proclus himself. We learn from Marinus 1 
that not all who attended his lectures were his philosophical 
disciples. The influence of the series of works, in so far as 
they were accepted officially, was to fix the " angelology " of 
the Church in a learned form. They also gave a powerful 
impulse to Christian mysticism, and, through Scotus Erigena, 
set going the pantheistic speculations which, as soon as 
thought once more awoke, began to trouble the faith. 

When, about the middle of the ninth century, there emerges 
the isolated figure of John Scotus Erigena, we may say, far as 
we still are from anything that can be called sunrise, that 

now at last the sacred influence 
Of light appears, and from the walls of Heaven 
Shoots far into the bosom of dim Night 
A glimmering dawn. 

He has been regarded both as a belated Neo-Platonist and 

as the first of the Scholastics. In reality he cannot be classed 

as a Neo-Platonist, for his whole effort was directed towards 

1 Vita Prodi, 38. 



188 THE INFLUENCE [CH. 

rationalising that system of dogmatic belief which the Neo- 
Platonists had opposed from the profoundest intellectual and 
ethical antipathy. On the other hand, he was deeply influenced 
by the forms of Neo-Platonic thought transmitted through 
Dionysius, whose works he translated into Latin; and his own 
speculations soon excited the suspicion of ecclesiastical au- 
thority. His greatest work, the De Divisione Naturae, was 
in 1225 condemned by Pope Honorius III to be burned. 
Scotus had, however, begun the characteristic movement of 
Christian Scholasticism. And Dionysius, who could not well 
be anathematised consistently with the accredited view about 
the authorship of his writings — who indeed was canonised, 
and came to be identified with St Denys of France — had been 
made current in Latin just at the moment when the know- 
ledge of Greek had all but vanished from the West. 

The first period of Scholasticism presents a great gap be- 
tween Scotus and the next considerable thinkers, who do not 
appear before the latter part of the eleventh century. To- 
wards the end of the twelfth century, the second period begins 
through the influx of new Aristotelian writings and of the 
commentaries upon them by the Arabians. The Arabians 
themselves, on settling down after their conquest of Western 
Asia, had found Aristotle already translated into Syriac. 
Translations were made from Syriac into Arabic. These 
translations and the Arabian commentaries on them were 
now translated into Latin, sometimes through Hebrew; the 
Jews being at this time again the great intermediaries be- 
tween Asia and Europe. Not long after, translations were 
made directly from the Greek texts preserved at Constanti- 
nople. Thus Western Europe acquired the complete body of 
Aristotle's logical writings, of which it had hitherto only 
possessed a part; and, for the first time since its faint re- 
awakening to intellectual life, it was put in possession of the 
works dealing with the content as well as the form of philo- 
sophy. After prohibiting more than once the reading of the 
newly recovered writings, and in particular of the Physics and 
Metaphysics, the ecclesiastical chiefs at length authorised 
them; having come to see in the theism of Aristotle, which 



X] OF NEOPLATONISM 189 

they were now able to discriminate from the pantheism of 
pseudo- Aristotelian writings, a preparation for the faith. It is 
from this period that the predominating scientific authority of 
Aristotle in the Christian schools must be dated. Taken over 
as a tradition from the Arabians, it had been by them received 
from the latest commentators of the Athenian school of Neo- 
Platonism. 

The Arabian philosophy, highly interesting in itself, is still 
more interesting to us for its effect on the intellectual life of 
Europe. Aristotelian in basis, it was Neo-Platonic in super- 
structure. Its distinctive doctrine of an impersonal immor- 
tality of the general human intellect is, however, as contrasted 
both with Aristotelianism and with Neo-Platonism, essentially 
original. This originality it does not owe to Mohammedanism. 
Its affinity is rather with Persian and Indian mysticism. Not 
that Mohammedanism wanted a speculative life of its own; 
but that which is known to history as "Arabian philosophy" 
did not belong to that life 1 . The proper intellectual life of 
Islam was in "theology." From the sharp antagonism which 
sprang up between the Arabian philosophers and "theo- 
logians" seems to date the antithesis which became current 
especially in the Europe of the Renaissance. For the Greek 
philosophers, "theology" had meant first a poetic exposition 
of myths, but with the implication that they contained, either 
directly or when allegorised, some theory of the origin of 
things. Sometimes — as occasionally in Aristotle and oftener 
in the Neo-Platonists — it meant the highest, or metaphysical, 
part of philosophy. It was the doctrine of God as first prin- 
ciple of things, and was accordingly the expression of pure 
speculative reason. With Islam, as with Christianity, it might 
mean this; but it meant also a traditional creed imposed by 
the authority of Church and State. The creed contained many 
articles which philosophy might or might not arrive at by the 
free exercise of reason. To the Mohammedan "theologian " 
however, these were not points which it was permissible to 
question, except hypothetically, but principles to argue from. 
Hence the "philosophers," having made acquaintance with 
1 See Renan, Averroes et V Averroisme, ch. ii. 



190 THE INFLUENCE [OH. 

the intellectual liberty of Greece, which they were seeking to 
naturalise in Arabian science, were led to adopt the custom of 
describing distinctively as a "theologian" one who speculated 
under external authority and with a practical purpose. Of 
course the philosophers claimed to deal equally — or, rather, 
at a higher level — with divine objects of speculation; but, 
according to their own view, they were not bound by the 
definitions of the theologian. At the same time, they were 
to defer to theology in popular modes of speech, allowing a 
"theological" truth, or truth reduced to what the multitude 
could profit by, in distinction from "philosophical" or pure 
truth. The Jews and the Christians too, they allowed, were 
in possession of theological truth; each religion being good 
and sufficient in practice for the peoples with whom it was 
traditional. The reason of this procedure — which has no pre- 
cise analogue either in ancient or in modern times — was that 
the Arabian Hellenising movement was pantheistic, while the 
three religions known to the philosophers all held to the 
personality of God. Hence the Arabian philosophy could not, 
like later Deism, find what it regarded as philosophic truth by 
denuding all three religions of their discrepant elements. Since 
they were expressed in rigorously defined creeds, it could not 
allegorise them as the ancient philosophers had allegorised 
polytheism. Nor was the method open to it of ostensibly 
founding a new sect. The dominant religions were theocratic, 
claiming the right, which was also the duty, of persecution. 
The consequence was, formulation of the strange doctrine 
known as that of the "double truth." 

Under the dominion of Islam, the "philosophers," in spite 
of their distinction between the two kinds of truth, were 
treated by the "theologians" as a hostile sect and reduced to 
silence. Their distinction, however, penetrated to Christian 
Europe, where, though condemned by Church Councils, it 
long held its ground as a defence against accusations of heresy. 
The orthodox distinction between two spheres of truth, to be 
investigated by different methods but ultimately not in con- 
tradiction, may easily be put in its place. Hence a certain 
elusiveness which no doubt helped to give it vogue in a society 



X] OF NEO-PLATONISM 191 

not inwardly quite submissive to the authority of the Church 
even at the time when the theocracy had apparently crushed 
all secular and intellectual opposition. The profundity of the 
revolt is evident alike in the philosophical and in the religious 
movements that marked the close of the twelfth and the 
opening of the thirteenth century. The ideas that animated 
both movements were of singular audacity. In philosophy, 
the intellectual abstractions of Neo-Platonism, and in particu- 
lar the abstraction of "matter," were made the ground for a 
revived naturalistic pantheism. Ideas of " absorption," or im- 
personal immortality, genuinely Eastern in spirit, may have 
appealed as speculations to the contemplative ascetics of 
Orientalised Europe. These were not the only ideas that 
came to the surface. In common with its dogmas, the Catholic 
hierarchy was threatened; and, to suppress the uprising, the 
City of Dis on earth was completed by the Dominican 
Inquisition. Yet philosophy, so far as it could be made sub- 
servient to orthodoxy, was to be a most important element in 
the training of the Dominicans themselves. From their Order 
proceeded Thomas Aquinas, the most systematic thinker of 
the Middle Ages, at whose hands scholastic Aristotelianism 
received its consummate perfection. Against older heresies, 
against "Averroism," against the pantheism of heterodox 
schoolmen, the Angelic Doctor furnished arguments accept- 
able to orthodoxy, marshalled in syllogistic array. For a short 
time, his system could intellectually satisfy minds of the 
highest power, skilled in all the learning of their age, if only 
they were in feeling at one with the dominant faith. 

Over and above its indirect influence through the psy- 
chology of the Fathers, Neo-Platonic thought found direct 
admission into the orthodox no less than into the heterodox 
speculation of the Scholastic period. Aquinas quotes largely 
from Dionysius; and Dante was, as is well known, a student 
both of Aquinas and of Dionysius himself, whose classification 
of the "Heavenly Hierarchy" he regarded as a direct revela- 
tion communicated by St Paul to his Athenian proselyte. 
Thus, if we find Neo-Platonic ideas in Dante, there is no diffi- 
culty about their source. The line of derivation goes straight 



192 THE INFLUENCE [CH. 

back to the teaching of Proclus. We are not reduced to the 
supposition of an indirect influence from Plotinus through 
St Augustine. Incidental Neo-Platonic expressions in Dante 
have not escaped notice 1 . More interesting, however, than 
any detailed coincidence is the fundamental identity of the 
poet's conception of the beatific vision with the vision of the 
intelligible world as figured by Plotinus. Almost equally 
prominent is the use he makes of the speculative conception 
of emanation. That the higher cause remains in itself while 
producing that which is next to it in order of being, is affirmed 
by Dante in terms that might have come directly from Plo- 
tinus or Proclus 2 . And it is essentially by the idea of emana- 
tion that he explains and justifies the varying degrees of 
perfection in created things. 

The Neo-Platonism of the Divina Commedia, as might be 
expected, is found almost exclusively in the Paradiso ; though 
one well-known passage in the Purgatorio, describing the mode 
in which the disembodied soul shapes for itself a new material 
envelope, bears obvious marks of the same influence. Here, 
however, there is an important difference. Dante renders 
everything in terms of extension, and never, like the Neo- 
Platonists, arrives at the direct assertion, without symbol, of 
pure immaterialism. This may be seen in the passage just 
referred to, as compared with a passage from Porphyry's 
exposition of Plotinus closely resembling it in thought. While 
Dante represents the soul as having an actual path from one 
point of space to another, Porphyry distinctly says that the 
soul's essence has no locality, but only takes upon itself re- 
lations depending on conformity between its dispositions and 

1 Some of them are referred to by Bouillet in the notes to his French 
translation of the Enneads (1857-61). 

Here, for want of a more appropriate place, it may be mentioned that there 
is no complete translation of the Enneads into English. The marvellous 
industry of Thomas Taylor, "the Platonist," in translating Neo-Platonic 
writings, did not carry him through the whole of Plotinus. The portions 
translated by him have been reprinted for the Theosophical Society in Bonn's 



2 The general thought finds expression at the end of Par. xxix. 
V eterno Valor... 
Uno manendo in se come davanti 



X] OF NEOPLATONISM 193 

those of a particular body ; the body, whether of grosser or of 
finer matter, undergoing local movement in accordance with 
its own nature and not with the nature of soul 1 . Again, the 
point of exact coincidence between Dante and Plotinus in 
what they say of the communications between souls that are 
in the world of being, is that, for both alike, every soul 
" there" knows the thought of every other without need of 
speech. Plotinus, however, says explicitly that the indi- 
vidualised intelligences within universal mind are together 
yet discriminated without any reference to space. What 
Dante says is that while the souls are not really in the plane- 
tary spheres, but only appear in them momentarily, they are 
really above in the empyrean. Even in his representation of 
the Deity, the Christian poet still retains his spatial symbolism. 
God is seen as the minutest and intensest point of light, round 
which the angels — who are the movers of the spheres — revolve 
in their ninefold order. At the same time, the divine mind is 
said to be the place of the primum mobile, thus enclosing the 
whole universe 2 . Viewed in relation to the universe as dis- 
tinguished from its cause, the angelic movers are in inverted 
order, the outermost and not the innermost being now the 
highest. Thus, by symbol, it is finally suggested that im- 
material essence is beyond the distinction of the great and 
the small in magnitude; but even at the end the symbolism 
has not disappeared. 

Like the completed theocratic organisation of society, the 
Scholastic system which furnished its intellectual justification 
was hardly finished before it began to break up from within. 
St Thomas Aquinas was followed by John Duns Scotus, who, 
while equally orthodox in belief, limited more the demonstra- 

1 Cf. Purg. xxv. 85-102 and Sententiae, 32. Porphyry is explaining the way 
in which the soul may be said to descend to Hades. 4ttcI 54 Si-qua to fiapv 
irvedfia /cat &vypoi> &XP 1 - T & v inroyelwv t6tto)v, oDtco kuI avrrj \4yerai xwpetV virb 
yrjv ' oi>x 3n r) aiirr) ovaia fi€Ta(3aLv€i tottovs, kclI 4v t6ttois ylverai ' a\X' on tCjv 
irecpvKOTWV aoifidruv tottovs fxeTafiaiveiv, xal elXrjxevcu tottovs, <rxe<reis aVa5^x erat J 
dexo^vuv a.vT7]v Kara rets 4TnTri5ei6T7)Tas tu>j> toioijtuv crcjfAaTOJv 4k tt)s /car' olvtt)v 
iroias dia64aeojs. 

2 E questo cielo non ha altro dove 
Che la mente divina. 

Par. xxvii. 109-110. 

w. 13 



194 THE INFLUENCE [CH. 

tive power of reason in relation to ecclesiastical dogma. Soon 
after came William of Ockham, whose orthodoxy is to some 
extent ambiguous. The criticisms of the Subtle and of the 
Invincible Doctor had for their effect to show the illusoriness 
of the systematic harmony which their great predecessor 
seemed to have given once for all to the structure composed 
of dominant Catholic theology and subordinated Aristotelian 
philosophy. Duns Scotus was indirectly influenced by Neo- 
Platonism, which came to him from the Jewish thinker Ibn 
Gebirol, known to the schoolmen as Avicebron. This was the 
source of his theory of a "first matter" which is a component 
of intellectual as of corporeal substances. His view that the 
"principle of individuation " is not matter but form, coincides 
with that of Plotinus. Ockham was a thinker of a different 
cast, representing, as against the Platonic Realism of Duns 
Scotus, the most developed form of mediaeval Nominalism. 
In their different ways, both developments contributed to 
upset the balance of the Scholastic eirenicon between science 
and faith. The rapidity , with which the disintegration was 
now going on may be judged from the fact that Ockham died 
about 1849, that is, before the end of the half-century which 
had seen the composition of the Divina Commedia. 

The end of Scholasticism as a system appealing to the living 
world is usually placed about the middle of the fifteenth cen- 
tury. From that time, it became first an obstruction in the 
way of newer thought, and then a sectarian survival. The 
six centuries of its effective life are those during which Greek 
thought was wholly unknown in its sources to the West. 
John Scotus Erigena was one of the very last who had some 
knowledge of Greek before the study of it revived in the Italy 
of Petrarch and Boccaccio. For the new positive beginning 
of European culture, the classical revival, together with the 
impulse towards physical research, — represented among the 
schoolmen by Roger Bacon, — was the essential thing. 

In the familiar story of the rise of Humanism, the point 
that interests us here is that the first ancient system to be 
appropriated in its content, and not simply studied as a 
branch of erudition, was Platonism. And it was with the eyes 



X] OF NEO-PLATONISM 195 

of the Neo-Platonists that the Florentine Academy read Plato 
himself. Marsilio Ficino, having translated Plato, turned next 
to Plotinus. His Latin translation of the Enneads appeared in 
1492 1 . Platonism was now set by its new adherents against 
Aristotelianism, whether in the Scholastic form or as restored 
by some who had begun to study it with the aid of the Greek 
instead of the Arabian commentaries. The name of Aristotle 
became for a time to nearly all the innovators the synonym of 
intellectual oppression. 

The Platonists of the early Renaissance were sincere Chris- 
tians in their own manner. This was not the manner of the 
Middle Age. The definitely articulated system of ecclesiastical 
dogma had no real part in their intellectual life. They were 
Christians in a general way; in the details of their thinking 
they were Neo-Platonists. In relation to astrology and magic, 
indeed, they were Neo-Platonists of a less critical type than 
the ancient chiefs of the school. Belief in both magic and 
astrology, it is hardly necessary to say, had run down through 
the whole course of the intervening centuries ; so that there 
was little as yet in the atmosphere of the modern time that 
could lead to a renewal of the sceptical and critical sifting 
begun by thinkers like Plotinus and Porphyry. The influence 
of Christianity shows itself in the special stress laid on the 
religious aspect of Neo-Platonism. An example of this is to 
be met with at the end of Marsilio Ficino's translation of 
Plotinus. In the arguments prefixed to the closing chapters, 
Ficino tries to make Plotinus say definitely that the union of 
the soul with God, once attained, is perpetual. He has himself 
a feeling that the attempt is not quite successful; and he 
rather contends that Plotinus was logically bound to make 
the affirmation than that it is there in his very words. As a 
matter of fact, Plotinus has nowhere definitely made it ; and 
it seems inconsistent alike with his own position that differ- 
ences of individuality proceed with necessity from eternal dis- 
tinctions in the divine intellect, and with his hypothetical use 
of the Stoic doctrine that events recur in exactly repeated 

1 The Greek was printed for the first time in 1580, when it appeared along 
with the translation. 

13—2 



196 THE INFLUENCE [CH. 

cycles. When he says that in the intelligible world, though 
not in earthly life, the vision is continuous, this does not by 
itself mean that the soul, when it has ascended, remains above 
without recurrent descents. It is true, nevertheless, that Plo- 
tinus and Porphyry did not so explicitly as their successors 
affirm that all particular souls are subject to perpetual 
vicissitude 1 . 

This point is of special interest because Ficino's interpre- 
tation may have helped to mislead Bruno, who, in a passage 
in the dedication of his Eroici Fur or i to Sir Philip Sidney, 
classes Plotinus, so far as this doctrine is concerned, with the 
"theologians." All the great philosophers except Plotinus, he 
says, have taught that the mutations in the destiny of souls 
are without term. On the other hand, all the great theologians 
except Origen have taught that the soul either attains final 
rest or is finally excluded from beatitude. The latter doctrine 
has a practical reference, and may be impressed on the many 
lest they should take things too lightly. The former is the 
expression of pure truth, and is to be taught to those who are 
capable of ruling themselves. Great as is for Plotinus the 
importance of the religious redemption to which his philo- 
sophy leads, the theoretic aspect of his system is here mis- 
apprehended. Nothing, however, could bring out more clearly 
than this pointed contrast, Bruno's own view. Coming near 
the end of Renaissance Platonism, as Ficino comes near its 
beginning, he marks the declared break with tradition and 
the effort after a completely independent philosophy. 

Other elements as well as Neo-Platonism contributed to 

Bruno's doctrine; yet he too proceeds in his metaphysics from 

the Neo-Platonic school. In expression, he always falls back 

upon its terms. The system, indeed, undergoes profound 

modifications. Matter and Form, Nature and God, become 

antithetic names of a single reality, rather than extreme 

terms in a causal series descending from the highest to the 

1 Thus St Augustine could commend Porphyry for what he took to be the 
assertion that the soul, having once wholly ascended to the realm of being, 
can never redescend to birth. That any soul can remain perpetually lapsed is 
unquestionably contrary to the opinion both of Plotinus and of Porphyry. 
One of Porphyry's objections to Christianity was that it taught that doctrine. 



X] OF NEO-PLATONISM 197 

lowest 1 . Side by side with the identity, however, the difference 
is retained, in order to express the "circle" in phenomenal 
things. In Bruno's cosmological view, modifications were of 
course introduced by his acceptance and extension of the 
Copernican astronomy. Yet he seeks to deduce this also from 
propositions of the Neo-Platonic metaphysics. The Neo-Pla- 
tonists held, as he did, that the Cause is infinite in potency, 
and necessarily produces all that it can produce. The reason 
why they did not infer that the extended universe is quanti- 
tatively infinite was that, like some moderns, they thought 
actual quantitative infinity an impossible conception. 

One of Bruno's most interesting points of contact with 
Plotinus is in his theory of the beautiful. For this he may 
have got the hint from the difference that had struck Plotinus 
between the emotion that accompanies pursuit of knowledge 
and beauty on the one hand, and mystical unification with the 
good on the other. By this unification, however, Plotinus does 
not mean moral virtue; so that when Bruno contrasts intellec- 
tual aspiration with a kind of stoical indifference to fortune, 
and treats it as a "defect" in comparison, because there is in 
the constantly baffled pursuit of absolute truth or beauty an 
element of pain, he is not closely following Plotinus. Yet in 
their account of the aspiration itself, the two thinkers agree. 
The fluctuation and pain in the aesthetic or intellectual life 
are insisted on by both. In Bruno indeed the thought is 
immensely expanded from the hint of Plotinus; the Eroici 
Furori being a whole series of imaginative symbols interpreted 
as expressive of the same ardour "to the unknown God of 
unachieved desire." There is here manifest a difference of 
temperament. Bruno had more of the restlessness which 
Plotinus finds in the soul of the artist and the theorist. 
Plotinus, along with his philosophical enthusiasm, had more 
of the detachment and repose of the religious mystic. 

The most striking difference between the Platonism of the 
Neo-Platonists and that of the Renaissance, is the stronger 

1 Identification of all in the unity of Substance is regarded by Vacherot as 
characterising Bruno's thought, in contrast with the Neo-Platonic "emana- 
tion." See Histoire Critique de Vficole d'Alexandrie, t. iii. p. 196. 



198 THE INFLUENCE [CH. 

accentuation by the latter of naturalistic pantheism. This, 
though not absent in Neo-Platonism itself, is subordinate. 
Plotinus, as we saw, regards the heavenly bodies as divine, 
and can on occasion speak like Bruno of the earth as one of the 
stars. This side of his doctrine, however, is less prominent 
than his conception of intellectual and superessential divinity. 
With Bruno the reverse is the case. And Campanella too seizes 
on the naturalistic side of the doctrine to confound the de- 
spisers of the visible world. Among his philosophical poems 
there is one in particular which conveys precisely the feeling 
of the book of Plotinus against the Gnostics. 

Deem you that only you have thought and sense, 
While heaven and all its wonders, sun and earth, 
Scorned in your dullness, lack intelligence ? 

Fool ! what produced you ? These things gave you birth : 
So have they mind and God 1 . 

This tone of feeling, characteristic of the Renaissance, passed 
away during the prevalence of the new " mechanical philo- 
sophy," to reappear later when the biological sciences were 
making towards theories of vital evolution. It is thus no 
accident that it should then have been rendered by Goethe, 
who combined with his poetic genius original insight in 
biology. 

While the Platonising movement was going on, other ancient 
doctrines had been independently revived. For the growth of 
the physical sciences, now cultivated afresh after long neglect, 
the revival of Atomism was especially important. The one 
scientific doctrine of antiquity which Neo-Platonism had been 
unable to turn to account was seen by modern physicists to be 
exactly that of which they were in need. Thus whether, like 
Descartes and Hobbes, they held that the universe is a plenum, 
or, with Democritus himself, affirmed the real existence of 

1 Sonnet xrx. in Symonds's translation. The original of the passage may- 
be given for comparison. 

Pensiti aver tu solo provvidenza, 

E '1 ciel la terra e 1' altre cose belle, 
Le quali sprezzi tu, starsene senza? 
Sciocco, d' onde se' nato tu? da quelle, 
Dunque ci e senno e Dio. 



X] OF NEO-PLATONISM 199 

vacuum, all the physical thinkers of the seventeenth century 
thought of body, for the purposes of science, as corpuscular. 
Corpuscular physics was the common foundation of the 
"mechanical philosophy." Now it is worthy of note that the 
first distinctively Platonic revival, beyond the period we call 
the Renaissance, decisively adopted the corpuscular physics 
as not incompatible with "the true intellectual system of the 
universe." The Cambridge Platonists, as represented especi- 
ally by Cud worth, did not, in their opposition to the naturalism 
of Hobbes, show any reactionary spirit in pure science; but 
were so much awake to the growing ideas of the time that, 
even before the great impression made by Newton's work, 
they were able to remedy for themselves the omission that had 
limited the scientific resources of their ancient predecessors. 
And More, in appending his philosophical poem on The In- 
finity of Worlds to that on The Immortality of the Soul, does 
not shrink from appealing to the authority of Democritus, 
Epicurus and Lucretius in favour of those infinite worlds in 
space which the Neo-Platonists had rejected. Neither on this 
question nor on the kindred one as to the manifestation of 
Deity in a phenomenal universe without past or future limit 
in time, does he commit himself to a final conclusion; but 
evidently, after at first rejecting both infinities as involving 
impossibilities of conception, he inclined to the affirmation 
of both. 

The new metaphysical position that philosophy had in the 
meantime gained, was the subjective point of view fixed by 
Descartes as the principle of his "method for conducting the 
reason and seeking truth in the sciences." This, as has been 
indicated, was remotely Neo-Platonic in origin; for the Neo- 
Platonists had been the first to formulate accurately those 
conceptions of immaterial subject and of introspective con- 
sciousness which had acquired currency for the later world 
through the abstract language of the schools. Thus Descartes, 
with Scholasticism and Humanism behind him, could go in a 
summary way through the whole process, without immersing 
himself in one or the other as a form of erudition ; and could 
then start, so far as the problem of knowledge is concerned, 



200 THE INFLUENCE [CH. 

where the ancients had left off. Knowledge of that which is 
within, they had found, is in the end the most certain. The 
originality of Descartes consisted in taking it as the most 
certain in the beginning. Having fixed the point of view, he 
could then proceed, from a few simple positions ostensibly 
put forward without appeal to authority, to construct a new 
framework for the sciences of the inner and of the outer world. 

Here was the beginning of idealism in its modern form. 
The other great innovation of the modern world in general 
principle, was the notion that there is a mode of systematic- 
ally appealing to experience as the test of scientific truth; 
that rational deduction, such as was still the main thing for 
Descartes, must be supplemented by, if not ultimately sub- 
ordinated to, the test of inductive verification. This, though 
not exclusively an English idea, has been mainly promoted by 
English thinkers, in its application first to the physical, and 
then, still more specially, to the mental sciences. In antiquity, 
experience had indeed been recognised as the beginning of 
knowledge in the genetic order. Its priority in this sense could 
be allowed by a school as rationalist as Neo-Platonism. It had 
not, however, even by the experiential schools, been rigorously 
defined as a test applicable to all true science. On this side 
Bacon and Locke, as on the other side Descartes, were the 
great philosophical initiators of the new time. 

The essential innovations of modern thought, as we see, 
were innovations in method. They did not of themselves 
suggest any new answer to questions about ultimate reality or 
the destiny of the universe. It is not that such answers have 
been lacking; but they have always remained, in one way or 
another, new formulations of old ones. The hope cherished by 
Bacon and Descartes that the moderns might at length cut 
themselves loose from the past and, by an infallible method, 
discover all attainable truth, has long been seen to be vain. 
Not only individual genius, but historical study of past ideas 
and systems, have become of more and not of less importance. 
The most original and typical ontologies of modern times are 
those of Spinoza and Leibniz; and, much as they owe to the 
newer developments of science and theory of knowledge, both 



X] OF NEO-PLATONISM 201 

are expressed by means of metaphysical conceptions that 
had taken shape during the last period of ancient thought. 
Pantheism and Monadism are not merely implicit in the Neo- 
Pl atonic doctrine; they receive clear formulation as different 
aspects of it. If, as some modern critics think, the two con- 
ceptions are not ultimately irreconcilable, the best hints for a 
solution may probably still be found in Plotinus. No one has 
ever been more conscious than he of the difficulty presented by 
the problem of comprehending as portions of one philosophical 
truth the reality of universal and that of individual intellect. 
Perhaps the strongest testimony to the intrinsic value of the 
later Greek thought is Berkeley's Siris. For if that thought 
had really become obsolete, Berkeley was in every way pre- 
pared to perceive it. He had pushed the Cartesian reform as 
far as it would go, by reducing what Descartes still thought of 
as real extended substance to a system of phenomena for 
consciousness. He had at the same time all the English 
regard for the test of experience, fortified by knowledge of 
what had been done in his own age in investigating nature. 
Thus, he had taken most decisively the two steps bj^ which 
modern philosophy has made a definite advance. Besides, as a 
theologian, he might easily have assumed that anything there 
was of value in the work of thinkers who, living long after 
the opening of the Christian era, had been the most uncom- 
promising antagonists of the Christian Church, must have 
been long superseded. His own early Nominalism, which, as 
may be seen in Siris itself, he had never abandoned, might also 
have been expected to prejudice him against Platonic Realism. 
Yet it is precisely in the Neo-Platonists that Berkeley, near 
the end of his philosophical career, found hints towards a ten- 
tative solution of ontological questions which he had at first 
thought to settle once for all by a resolutely logical carrying 
out of the principles of Descartes and Locke. It is true that 
in actual result Siris makes no advance on the original Neo- 
Platonic speculations, which are not really fused with Berke- 
ley's own early doctrine, but are at most kept clear of contra- 
diction with it. For all that, Siris furnishes the most decisive 
evidence of enduring vitality in a school of thought which, 



202 THE INFLUENCE [CH. 

to Berkeley's age if to any since the classical revival, must 
have seemed entirely of the past. 

Berkeley's work here seems in a manner comparable with 
that of the Platonising English poets from Spenser to Shelley. 
The influence of Platonism on literature is, however, too wide 
a subject to be treated episodically. The one remark may be 
made, that not till modern times did it really begin to influence 
poetic art. In antiquity it had its theories of art, — varying 
greatly, as we have seen, from Plato to Plotinus, — but artistic 
production was never inspired by it. If poetic thought, as 
some think, is an anticipation of the future, this influence on 
poetry may be taken as further evidence that the ideas of the 
philosophy itself are still unexhausted. 

During the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the great 
controversies of metaphysics did not centre in Platonism. 
There is truth in the view that would make this first period 
of distinctively modern philosophy a kind of continuation of 
later Scholasticism, more than of the Renaissance which im- 
mediately preceded it. Its ostensible questions were about 
method. The usual division of its schools or phases by his- 
torians is into "Dogmatism" (by which is meant the rational- 
istic theory of certitude) and its opposite "Empiricism," 
followed by "Scepticism" and then by "Criticism." As these 
names show, it is concerned less with inquiry into the nature 
of reality than with the question how reality is to be known, or 
whether indeed knowledge of it is possible. And, with all its 
differences, the modern "Enlightenment" has this resemblance 
to Scholasticism, that a particular system of doctrine is always 
in the background, to which the controversy is tacitly referred. 
This system is in effect the special type of theism which the 
more rationalistic schoolmen undertook to prove as a pre- 
liminary to faith in the Catholic creed. Even in its non- 
Christian form, as with the "Deists," it is still of the Judaeo- 
Christian tradition. The assumption about the relation of 
God to the world is that the world was created by an act of 
will. Ordinary Rationalism is "dogmatic" by its assertion 
that "natural religion" of this type can be demonstrated. 
"Empiricism" usually holds that the same general positions 



X] OF NEO-PLATONISM 203 

can be established sufficiently on at least "probable" grounds. 
The Scepticism of Hume proceeds to show the failure of 
Empiricism — with which he sides philosophically as against 
Rationalism — to establish anything of the kind. Hume's 
philosophical questioning, while this was the practical refer- 
ence which aroused so much lively feeling in his own age, had 
of course a wider reach. Yet when Kant, stirred by the im- 
pulse received from Hume, took up again from a "Critical" 
point of view the whole problem as to the possibility of know- 
ledge, he too thought with a reference to the same practical 
centre of the controversy. Having destroyed the Wolffian 
"Dogmatism," he still aimed at reconstructing from its 
theoretical ruin a generalised theology of essentially the same 
type. For Kant, as for the line of thinkers closed by him, 
there was only one ontology formally in question; and that 
was Christian theism, with or without the Christian revelation. 
The German movement at the opening of the nineteenth 
century, if it did nothing else, considerably changed this aspect 
of things. In its aims, whatever may now be thought of its 
results, it was a return to ontology without presuppositions. 
The limited dogmatic system which was the centre of interest 
for the preceding period has for the newer speculation passed 
out of sight. Spinoza perhaps on the positive side exercises 
a predominant influence; but there are returns also to the 
thinkers of the Renaissance, to Neo-Platonism, and to the 
ancient systems of the East, now beginning to be known in 
Europe from translations of their actual documents. A kind 
of Neo- Christianity too appears, which again treats Christian 
dogma in the spirit of the Gnostics or of Scotus Erigena. And 
all this is complicated by the necessity imposed on every 
thinker of taking up a definite attitude to the Kantian 
criticism of knowledge. Among the systems of the time, that 
of Hegel in particular has frequently been compared to Neo- 
Platonism; but here the resemblance is by no means close. 
The character of Hegel's system seems to have been deter- 
mined mainly by its relation to preceding German philosophy 
and to Spinoza. Both on Spinoza himself and on Leibniz, the 
influence of Neo-Piatonism, direct or indirect, was much more 



204 THE INFLUENCE OF NEO-PLATONISM [CH. x 

definite, and points of comparison might be sought with more 
profit. In Hegel, as in the other philosophers of the period, 
the resemblance is partly of a quite general kind. They are 
again ontologists, interested in more possibilities than in the 
assertion or denial of the rudiments of a single creed. But, 
knowing the historical position of the Neo-Platonists, they 
find in them many thoughts that agree with their personal 
tendencies. 

Up to this point the outline given of the course of later 
philosophy may, it seems to me, on the whole be regarded as 
abbreviated history. The next stage may perhaps be summed 
up as another return from ontology to questions about the 
possibility of knowledge, and to logical and methodological 
inquiries. To pursue further the attempt to characterise the 
successive stages of European thought would be to enter the 
region where no brief summary can fairly pretend to be a 
deposit of ascertained results. The best plan, from the point 
now reached, will be to try to state the law of philosophic 
development which the history of Neo-Platonism suggests; 
and then to make some attempt to learn what positive value 
the doctrine may still have for the modern world. This will 
be the subject of the concluding chapter. 



CHAPTER XI 

CONCLUSION 

Once the Neo-Platonic period, instead of being left in 
shadow, is brought into clear historical light, the development 
of Greek philosophy from Thales to Proems is seen to consist 
of two alternations from naturalism to idealism. The "physi- 
cal" thinkers are followed by Socrates, Plato and Aristotle. 
Then, by a similar antithesis, the more developed naturalism 
of the Stoics and Epicureans is followed by the more developed 
idealism of the Neo-Platonists. The psychology of the Greeks 
has been brought by Prof. Siebeck under the order assigned by 
this law. Mr Benn has suggested the law as that of Greek 
philosophy in general, but without carrying it through in its 
application to the details 1 . When to the empirical formula the 
test of psychological deduction is applied, this seems to show 
that it must have a more general character — that it must be a 
law, not only of Greek thought, but of the thought of man- 
kind. For evidently, as the objective and subjective points of 
view become distinguished, the mind must tend to view things 
first objectively, and then afterwards to make a reflective 
return on its own processes in knowing. Thus we ought to 
find universally that a phase of speculative naturalism — the 
expression of the objective point of view — is followed, when 
reflection begins to analyse things into appearances for mind, 
by a phase of idealism. Unfortunately, no exact verification of 
so extended a deduction can be made out. All that can be said 
is that the facts do hot contradict it. 

The law, in the most general terms, may be stated thus: 
Whenever there is a spontaneous development of philosophic 
thought beyond the stage of dependence on tradition, a 

1 Both historians call the later phase Spiritualism, but on etymological 
grounds Idealism is the preferable term. "Spirit" {-Kvevfia), as Prof. Siebeck 
has shown in his detailed history, was not used by the Greek philosophers 
themselves as the name of an immaterial principle. 



206 CONCLUSION [CH. 

naturalistic phase comes first and an idealistic phase second. 
In no intrinsic development, whether of individuals or of 
peoples, is there a reversal of the order. One or other of the 
phases, however, may be practically suppressed. An indi- 
vidual mind, or the mind of a people, may stop at naturalism, 
or after the most evanescent phase of it may go straight on to 
pure idealism. Where both phases definitely appear, as in the 
case of Greece, we must expect returns of the first, making a 
repeated rhythm. Further, we must take account of foreign 
influences, which may modify the intrinsic development. 
Also, when both stages have been passed through, and are 
represented by their own teachers, revivals of either may 
appear at any moment. Thus in modern Europe we can 
hardly expect to trace through the whole development any 
law whatever. When thinkers began to break through the 
new tradition which had substituted itself for ancient myth- 
ology and philosophy alike, and had ruled through the Middle 
Ages, there was from the first a possibility, according to the 
temper of the individual mind, of reviving any phase of doc- 
trine, naturalistic or idealistic, without respect to its order in 
the past. We may occasionally get a typical case of the law, 
as in the idealistic reaction of the Cambridge Platonists on the 
naturalism of Hobbes; but we cannot expect anything like 
this uniformly. 

Two great ethnical anomalies are the precisely opposite 
cases of India (that is, of the Hindus) and of China. Nowhere 
in Asia of course has there been that self-conscious break with 
traditional authority which we find in ancient Greece and in 
modern Europe; in both of which cases, however, it must be 
remembered that the authoritative tradition has never ceased 
to exist, but has continued always, even in the most sceptical 
or rational periods, to possess more of direct popular power 
than philosophy. The philosophies of India and of China are 
not formally distinct from their religions, and have not found 
it necessary to repudiate any religious belief simply as such. 
Still, each has a very distinct character of its own. The official 
philosophy of China is as purely naturalistic as that of India is 
idealistic. And in both cases the learned doctrine succeeds in 



XI] CONCLUSION 207 

giving a general direction to the mind of the people without 
appealing to force. With the Hindus, naturalism seems to have 
been an almost entirely suppressed phase of development. The 
traces of it found in some of the philosophic systems may be 
remains of an abortive attempt at a naturalistic view of things 
in India itself, or may be the result of a foreign influence such 
as that of Greek Atomism. On the other hand, the Taoism and 
the Buddhism of China are admittedly much reduced from the 
elevation they had at first, and have become new elements in 
popular superstition instead of idealistic philosophies. Bud- 
dhism of course is Indian; and Taoism, in its original form 
perhaps the sole attempt at metaphysics by a native Chinese 
teacher, seems to have been an indeterminate pantheism, not 
strictly to be classed either as naturalistic or as idealistic. 
Both are officially in the shade as compared with Confucian- 
ism; and this, while agnostic with regard to metaphysics, is as 
a philosophy fundamentally naturalistic ; adding to ancestral 
traditions about right conduct simply a very general idea of 
cosmic order as the theoretic basis for its ethical code. 

India and China being thus taken to represent one-sided 
evolutions of the human mind, we shall see in ancient Greece 
the normal sequence under a comparatively simplified form. 
In modern Europe we shall see a complex balance of the two 
tendencies. Turning from the question of historical law to 
that of philosophical truth, we may conjecture that the re- 
flective process must somehow mark an advance in insight; 
but that, if nothing is to be lost, it ought to resume in itself 
what has gone before. And, as a matter of fact, European 
idealists, both ancient and modern, have not been content 
unless they could incorporate objective science with their 
metaphysics. 

Thus we arrive at a kind of "law of three states " — tradition 
or mythology, naturalism, idealism. In its last two terms, this 
law seems to be an inversion of the sequence Comte sought to 
establish from the "metaphysical" to the "positive" stage; 
naturalism being the philosophy underlying "positivism," 
while idealism is another name for "metaphysics." How then 
are we to explain Comte's own mental development? For he 



208 CONCLUSION [CH. 

undoubtedly held that he himself had passed from tradition 
through "metaphysics" to "positivity." Exceptio probat 
regulam: "the exception tests the rule 1 ." In the first place, 
what Comte regarded as his own metaphysical stage was not 
metaphysics at all, but a very early mode of political thought 
in which he accepted from eighteenth century teachers their 
doctrine of abstract "natural rights." In the second place, 
his mental history really had a kind of metaphysical phase ; 
but this came after his strictly "positive" or naturalistic 
period. His later philosophy became subjective on two sides. 
Having at first regarded mathematics as the sufficient formal 
basis of all the sciences, he arrived later at the view that before 
the philosophy of mathematics there ought to be set out a 
more general statement of principles. That is to say, his in- 
tention was to fill up the place that belongs properly to logic, 
which in its formal division is subjective. Again, in his later 
scheme, after the highest of the sciences, which he called 
"morality" — meaning really a psychology of the individual, 
placed after and not before sociology — there came his "sub- 
jective synthesis." This was an adumbration of metaphysics 
in the true sense of the term; so that his circle of the sciences, 
beginning with formal principles of reasoning, would have 
completed itself by running into subjectivity at the other 
extreme. The apparently exceptional case of Comte therefore 
turns out to be a real confirmation of the law. 

However it may be with this proposed law of three states, 
there can be no doubt that a very highly developed form of 
idealism is represented by the Neo-Platonists. How does this 
stand in relation to modern thought? An obvious position to 
take up would be to allow the merit of Plotinus and his suc- 
cessors in scientifically elaborating the highest metaphysical 
conceptions, but to dismiss all their detailed ontology as of 
merely historic interest. Thus we should fall back upon a 
position suggested by Plato in the Philebus; namely, that 
though there may be very little "dialectical," or, as we should 
now say, metaphysical knowledge, that little may be "jDure 2 ." 

1 See Prof. Carveth Read's Logic, 1st ed., p. 214; 4th ed., p. 274. 

2 Phileb. 58 c. 



xi] CONCLUSION 209 

This, however, is too easy a way. The Neo-Platonic thought 
is, metaphysically, the maturest thought that the European 
world has seen. Our science, indeed, is more developed; and 
so also, with regard to some special problems, is our theory 
of knowledge. On the other hand, the modern time has 
nothing to show comparable to a continuous quest of truth 
about reality during a period of intellectual liberty that lasted 
for a thousand years. What it has to show, during a much 
shorter period of freedom, consists of isolated efforts, bounded 
by the national limitations of its philosophical schools. The 
essential ideas, therefore, of the ontology of Plotinus and 
Proclus may still be worth examining in no merely antiquarian 
spirit. 

A method of examination that suggests itself is to try 
whether, after all, something of the nature of verification may 
not be possible in metaphysics. The great defect of idealistic 
philosophy has been that so little can be deduced from it. The 
facts of nature do not, indeed, contradict it, but they seem to 
offer no retrospective confirmation of it. Now this, to judge 
from the analogy of science, may be owing to the extreme 
generality with which modern idealism is accustomed to state 
its positions. It is as if in physics we were reduced to an 
affirmation of the permanence of "matter" defined in Aristo- 
telian terminology. Let us try what can be made of an 
idealistic system that undertakes to tell us more than that 
reality is in some way to be expressed in terms of mind. 
Plotinus and Proclus, from their theory of being, make de- 
ductions that concern the order of phenomena. Since their 
time, great discoveries have been made in phenomenal science. 
Do these tend to confirm or to contradict the deductions made 
from their metaphysical principles by the ancient thinkers? 

We must allow, of course, for the defective science of an- 
tiquity. The Neo-Platonists cannot be expected to hold any 
other than the Ptolemaic astronomy. They do not, however, 
profess to deduce the details of astronomy from their meta- 
physics. Just as with the moderns, much in the way of detail 
is regarded as given only by experience. That the universe 
has this precise constitution — if it has it — is known only as 
w. 14 



210 CONCLUSION [CH 

an empirical fact, not as a deduction from the nature of its 
cause. What the Neo-Platonists deduce metaphysically is not 
the geocentric system, but the stability of that system — or 
of any other — if it exists. Thus they do not agree with the 
Stoics; who, though taking the same view about the present 
constitution of the universe, held that the system of earth 
with surrounding planetary and stellar spheres is periodically 
resolved into the primeval fire and again reconstituted, the 
resolution being accompanied by an enormous expansion of 
bulk. All such ideas of an immense total change from a given 
state of things to its opposite, Plotinus and his successors re- 
ject. Any cycle that they can allow involves only changes of 
distribution in a universe ordered always after the same 
general fashion. They carry this even into their interpretation 
of early thinkers like Empedocles. According to Simplicius, 
the periods of concentration and diffusion which alternate in 
his cosmogony were by Empedocles himself only assumed 
hypothetically, and to facilitate scientific analysis and syn- 
thesis 1 . For universal intellect, as all the Neo-Platonists say, 
is ever-existent and produces the cosmic order necessarily; 
hence it does not sometimes act and sometimes remain in- 
active. Undeviating necessity, in its visible manifestation as 
in reality, belongs to the divinity above man as to the un- 
conscious nature below him. Change of manifestation de- 
pending on apparently arbitrary choice between opposites 
belongs to man from his intermediate position. To attribute 
this to the divinity is mythological. There must therefore 
always be an ordered universe in which every form and grade 
of being is represented. The phenomenal world, flowing from 
intellectual being by a process that is necessary and as it were 
natural, is without temporal beginning or end. These pro- 
positions we are already familiar with; and these are the 
essence of the deduction. Thus if the universe — whatever its 
detailed constitution may be — does not always as a whole 
manifest a rational order, the metaphysical principle is funda- 
mentally wrong. To prove scientifically that the world points 
to an absolute temporal beginning, or that it is running down 
1 De Caelo (R. P. 133 i.*). 



XI] CONCLUSION 211 

to an absolute temporal end, or even that it is as a whole 
alternately a chaos and a cosmos, would be a refutation of the 
form of idealism held by Plotinus. How then does modern 
science stand with regard to this position? 

It may seem at first sight to contradict it. For does not 
the theory of cosmic evolution suppose just such immense 
periodic changes as were conceived by Empedocles, according 
to the most obvious interpretation of his words? So far as the 
solar system is concerned, no doubt it does; but the solar 
system is only a part of the universe. And there seems to be 
no scientific evidence for the theory that the universe as a 
whole has periods of evolution and dissolution. Indeed, the 
evidence points rather against this view. Astronomical ob- 
servers find existent worlds in all stages. This suggests that, 
to an observer on any planet, the stellar universe would always 
present the same general aspect, though never absolute 
identity of detail as compared with its aspect at any other 
point of time. For every formed system that undergoes dis- 
solution, some other is evolved from the nebulae which we 
call relatively "primordial." Thus the total phenomenal 
manifestation of being remains always the same. If this view 
should gain strength with longer observation, then science 
may return in the end to the Neo-Platonic cosmology on an 
enlarged scale, and again conceive of the whole as one stable 
order, subject to growth and decay only in its parts. At no 
time, as the metaphysician will say, is the mind of the uni- 
verse wholly latent. There is no priority of sense to intellect 
in the whole. The apparent priority of matter, or of the 
sentiency of which matter is the phenomenon, is simply an 
imaginative representation of the evolutionary process in a 
single system, regarded in isolation from the universe of 
which it forms part. 

That this view is demonstrated by science cannot of course 
be said. The evidence, however, is quite consistent with it, 
and seems to point to this rather than to any other of the 
possible views. The question being not yet scientifically 
settled, the idealism of Plotinus still offers itself, by the 
cosmology in which it issues, for verification or disproof. And 

U— 2 



212 CONCLUSION [CH. 

empirical confirmation, if this were forthcoming, would be 
quite real as far as it goes, precisely because the metaphysical 
doctrine is not so very general as to be consistent with all 
possible facts. A scientific proof that the universe is running 
down to a state of unalterable fixation would refute it. 

To the speculative doctrine of Plotinus no very great 
addition, as we have seen, was made before Proclus. The 
additions that Proclus was able to make have by historians as 
a rule been treated as useless complications, — multiplications 
of entities without necessity. Yet the power of Proclus as a 
thinker is not denied even by those who find little to admire 
in its results: and it had undergone assiduous training. He 
may be said to have known in detail the whole history of 
ancient thought, scientific as well as philosophical, at a time 
when it could still be known without any great recourse to 
fragments and conjecture. And he came at the end of a 
perfectly continuous movement. It is therefore of special 
interest to see how the metaphysical developments he arrived 
at appear in the light of discoveries made since the European 
community returned again to the systematic pursuit of know- 
ledge. 

What is noteworthy first of all is the way in which, following 
Aristotle, he has incorporated with the idea of the one stable 
universe that of an upw T ard movement in the processes that 
belong to the realm of birth. As we have seen, he distinctly 
says that in the order of genesis the imperfect comes before 
the perfect. And this is not meant simply in reference to the 
individual organism, w r here it is merely a generalised state- 
ment of obvious facts, but is applied on occasion to the history 
of science. Now the technical terms by wirich he expresses the 
philosophical idea of emanation admit of transference to an 
evolutionary process in time through which its components 
may be supposed to become explicit. The 7r/c»ooSo? and the 
i7riarpo(f>7J, or the going forth from the metaphysical principle 
and the return to it, are not of course themselves processes of 
the universe in time. Yet there is no reason why they should 
not have respectively their temporal manifestations in its 
parts, so long as neither type of manifestation is supposed to 



XI] CONCLUSION 213 

be chronologically prior or posterior in relation to the whole. 
When the terms are thus applied, they find accurate expression 
in the idea of an evolution, and not of a lapse manifested 
chronologically, — with which "emanation" is sometimes con- 
founded. Primarily, it is the einarpo^rj, rather than the 
77-pooSo?, that becomes manifest as the upward movement. 
Indeed the term corresponds pretty closely to "involution," 
which, as Spencer has said 1 , would more truly express the 
nature of the movement than "evolution." This process is 
seen in history when thought, by some great discovery, returns 
to its principle. The antithetic movement, which may be re- 
garded as the manifestation of the 777)00809, is seen when, for 
example, a great discovery is carried, as time goes on, into 
more and more minute details, or is gradually turned to 
practical applications. Thus it corresponds to most of what 
in modern times is called "progress." A corollary drawn by 
Proclus from his system, it may be noted, also suggests itself 
from the point of view of modern evolution. The highest and 
the lowest things, Proclus concludes, are simple; "compo- 
sition," or complexity, belongs to intermediate natures. 

An even more remarkable point of contact between the 
metaphysics of Proclus and later science is that which presents 
itself when we bring together his doctrine of the "divine 
henads" and the larger conceptions of modern astronomy. 
This doctrine, as we saw, is with Proclus abstract metaphysics. 
The One, he reasons, must be mediated to the remoter things 
by many unities, to each of which its own causal "chain" is 
attached. Elaborate as the theory is, it had, when put forth, 
hardly any concrete application. If, however, we liberate the 
metaphysics from the merely empirical part of the cosmology , 
a large and important application becomes clear. The primal 
One, as we know, is by Neo-Platonism identified with the 
Platonic Idea of the Good. Now this, with Plato, corresponds 
in the intelligible world to the sun in the visible world, and is 
its cause. But if, as Proclus concluded, the One must be 
mediated to particular beings by many divine unities, what 
constitution should we naturally suppose the visible universe 
1 First Principles, 6th ed., p. 261. 



214 CONCLUSION [CH. 

to have? Evidently, to each "henad" would correspond a 
single world which is one of many, each with its own sun. 
Thus the metaphysical conception of Proclus exactly pre- 
figures the post-Copernican astronomy, for which each of the 
fixed stars is the centre of a planetary " chain," and the source 
of life to the living beings that appear there in the order of 
birth 1 . 

From the infinite potency of the primal Cause, Bruno drew 
the inference that the universe must consist of actually in- 
numerable worlds. If we take the Neo-Platonic doctrine, not 
in its most generalised form — in which, as soon as we go be- 
yond a single world, it might seem to issue naturally in an 
assertion of the quantitative infinite — but with the additions 
made to it by Proclus, the plurality of worlds certainly be- 
comes more scientifically thinkable. For the "henads" — 
composing, as Proclus says, the plurality nearest to absolute 
unity — are finite in number. Quantitative infinity he in com- 
mon with all the school rejects 2 . A kind of infinity of space 
as a subjective form would have presented no difficulty. In- 
deed both the geometrical and the arithmetical infinite were 
allowed by Plotinus in something very like this sense. The 
difficulty was in the supposition that there are actually 
existent things in space which are infinite in number. The 
problem, of course, still remains as one of metaphysical 
inference. For there can be no astronomical proof either that 
the whole is finite or that it is infinite. An infinite real ethereal 
space, with a finite universe of gravitating matter — which 
seems to be the tacit supposition of those who argue from the 
fact of radiant heat that the sum of worlds is running down 
to an end — Bruno and his Neo-Platonic predecessors would 
alike have rejected. 

1 That the supreme unity, in distinction from the henads, has no central 
body to correspond with it, would have removed, not created, a difficulty. 
To Proclus, the representation of the transcendent idea of the good by a 
particular physical body in the universe was embarrassing (see Comm. in 
Eemp., ed. Kroll, i. 274-5; cf. in Tim. 170 e, ed. Diehl, ii. 102). 

2 He himself, however, regarded it as most plausible, if there are more 
worlds than one, that they should be infinite in number; for a finite number 
would seem accidental (Comm. in Tim. 133 c, ed. Diehl, i. 438). But clearly 
this objection applies also to his own henads. 



xi] CONCLUSION 215 

The Neo-Platonic idealism, it ought now to be evident, was 
far removed from the reproach of peculiar inability to bring 
itself into relation with the things of time and space. If both 
finally baffle the attempt at complete mental comprehension, 
this, the philosophers would have said, is because they are 
forms of becoming, and hence remain mixed with illusory 
imagination. Contrasted with the eternity of intellect, that 
which appears under those forms is in a sense unreal. The 
whole philosophy of "genesis," however largely conceived, 
becomes again what it was for Parmenides, to whom the 
explanations of physics, though having truth as a coherent 
order in the world of appearance, where 

irav irXeov early 6/jlov (fxieos /cal vvkto<; atyavrov, 
lacov aficfrorepcov 1 , 

are yet false as compared with the unmixed truth of being. 
In whatever sense Parmenides conceived of being, the Neo- 
Platonists. as we know, conceived of it in the manner of 
idealism. Their idealistic ontology, not deprived of all its 
detail but merely of its local and temporal features, would, if 
accepted, clear up more things than the most ambitious of 
modern systems. That it does not in the end profess to make 
all things clear, should not be to a modern mind a reason for 
contemning it, but should rather tell in its favour. 

1 Parmenides ap. Simplic. Phys. (Ft. 9, Diels). 



APPENDIX 

I. The Communism of Plato 

The feature of Plato's Republic that has drawn most general 
attention both in ancient and in modern times is its com- 
munism. This communism, however, had no place in the 
doctrine of his philosophical successors. And his system is in 
one important point quite opposed to that which is usual in 
modern socialism with its effort after equality. Some unre- 
membered anticipation of this may have been caricatured by 
Aristophanes in the Ecclesiazusae : but the artifices in the 
comedy for maintaining strict "democratic justice" are of 
course the very antithesis of the Platonic conception, the 
essence of which is to cultivate to the highest point, by 
separation of classes and by special training, every natural 
difference of faculty. Besides, the Platonic community of 
goods is applied only to the ruling philosophic class of guar- 
dians and to the military class of their auxiliaries. The 
industrial portion of the community is apparently left to the 
system of private property and commercial competition — 
though no doubt with just so much regulation from the guar- 
dians as is necessary to preserve the social health and keep 
down imposthumes. Now the interesting thing is that this 
offers something far more practicable than socialism of the 
modern industrial type. 

That this is so may be seen by bringing the Platonic com- 
munity of goods into comparison with Spencer's generalisa- 
tions, in the third volume of his Principles of Sociology, on the 
origin of "Professional Institutions." Spencer shows that 
professional, as distinguished from industrial, institutions are 
all differentiated from the priesthood, which, along with the 
military class, forms the dominant part of the earliest special- 
ised society. Now the remuneration of all professional classes 
is for a long time public. Like Plato's guardians, they receive 
support from the rest of the community, not so much for 
particular services as for constant readiness to perform certain 
kinds of service. And a sort of disinterested character long 
continues to be assumed in professional functions, so that the 
remuneration is formally a voluntary gift, and not the market 
price of the service immediately done. This is now looked 



APPENDIX 217 

upon as a " survival." The normal system is thought to be 
that in which every form of social activity is thrown into the 
competition of the market-place. Perhaps Spencer himself 
took this view. If, however, we follow out the clue supplied 
by his inductions, we are led to imagine a new transformation 
by which predominant industrialism might, having done its 
work, be displaced by a reform in the spirit though not 
according to the letter of the Platonic communism. 

Industrial institutions, as Spencer says, are for the " susten- 
tation" of life; professional institutions are for its "augmen- 
tation." Now, where there is to be augmentation, sustenta- 
tion, and the activities subservient to it, must not be the 
direct aim of everyone in the community. Among Spencer's 
"professional" activities, for example, are science and philo- 
sophy. The beginnings of these, Aristotle had already said, 
appeared among the Egyptian priests because they had 
leisure to speculate. As Hobbes put it, "leisure is the mother 
of philosophy." The same thing is recognised in Comte's 
social reconstruction, where, though individual property is 
retained, commercial competition is allowed only in the in- 
dustrial sphere ; the class that corresponds to the higher class 
of Plato's guardians being supported publicly on condition of 
renouncing all claim to a private income. The difference of 
Comte's from Plato's scheme is that it is social and not 
directly political. Comte assigns no "secular power" to his 
ecclesiastical or philosophical class. What Spencer's inductive 
conclusions also suggest is a social rather than a political 
transformation, but one more generalised than Comte's. For 
the professional class, as conceived by Spencer, includes much 
more than the philosophic and scientific class. It is far too 
differentiated to be restored to anything like the homogeneity 
of an early priesthood. Hence it could not, as such, become a 
ruling class, either directly like Plato's guardians, or indirectly 
like the Comtean hierocracy. 

The point of the reform that suggests itself is this : if the 
whole social organism is ever to be brought under an ethical 
ideal of the performance of social duties, transcending the 
conception of an unmitigated struggle for individual profit 
or subsistence, the class to begin with is the class which, by 
its origin, has already something of the disinterested charac- 
ter. The liberal professions must be, as it were, brought back 
to their original principles. The natural method of achieving 
this would be an extension of the system of public payment 
as opposed to quasi-commercial competition. Competition 



218 APPENDIX 

itself cannot be dispensed with; but it would then be in view 
of selection or promotion by qualified judges, and no longer 
with a view to individual payments from members of the 
general community taken at random. Payments would be 
graduated but fixed; not left to the chances of employment 
in each particular case. In short, the method would be that 
of the ecclesiastical and military professions, and of the Civil 
Service, generalised; though it would no doubt be necessary, 
as Comte admitted in the case of teachers, to leave just 
enough liberty of private practice to guard against the re- 
pression of originality. 

To attempt such a reform from below, as is the idea of 
industrial socialism, is evidently chimerical. Industrial in- 
stitutions have their first origin in the necessity of subsistence, 
not in an overflow of unconstrained energy; and, so far as they 
are developed from within, they owe their development to the 
keenest desire for gain. Hence they cannot but be the last to 
be effectively "moralised." This is just as fatal to Comte's 
proposal that the supreme secular power should be handed 
over to the "industrial chiefs" as it is to "social democracy." 
A purely industrial society could not supply enough dis- 
interested elements for the work of general regulation. The 
conclusion seems to be that competition with a view to indi- 
vidual profit must, as Plato and Comte equally recognised, 
be left in the industrial sphere because in that sphere it 
supplies the only natural and adequate motive of exertion; 
but that, even there, it can only be carried on justly and 
humanely under political regulation by representatives of the 
whole community. To constitute a complete political society, 
it is generally allowed that there must be diversity of interests. 
If we allow that there must also be disinterested elements, 
then it is evident that these can only be fitly developed by the 
reduction of material motives, within a certain portion of the 
society, to their lowest possible limit. The Platonic com- 
munism was the first attempt to solve this problem syste- 
matically instead of leaving it to accident. 

II. The Gnostics 

While the generalised position about the Gnostics stated at 
the end of Chapter III is still quite in conformity with what 
is known, I have to correct the more special interpretations 
adopted in the Appendix as it appeared in the first edition. 
In the present outline of the views since arrived at, I have 



APPENDIX 219 

carried over particular points that can still be sustained ; but 
the account of the relation of Gnosticism, — or, more accu- 
rately, of the gnosis, — to Christianity has had to be radically 
modified. 

A critic in The Guardian who objected to the classification 
of Gnosticism as a development of Christianity was sub- 
stantially right. It is true that the article of R. A. Lipsius in 
Ersch and Gruber's Encyclopaedia, to which I referred as the 
most accurate appreciation of Gnosticism known to me, repre- 
sented an advance on the position of Matter, in his Histoire 
Critique du Gnosticisme, that it was an amalgam of Christi- 
anity with Greek philosophy and miscellaneous theogonies. 
Lipsius recognised that the gnosis was fundamentally Oriental, 
and here he was right; but his presupposition that it was a 
spontaneous development from Christian data was mistaken ; 
and in tracing its non-Judaic and non-Christian elements to 
Phoenician and Syro-Chaldaic polytheism, he took too limited 
a view. The theory of its origins has since been revolutionised 
by studies like those of R. Reitzenstein on the ancient 
"mystery-religions" and the theosophic speculations that 
arose from their intermixture. As books of epoch-making 
importance, containing points of view that will necessitate 
the re-writing of the whole history of Gnosticism, I must 
mention especially Reitzenstein's Poimandres (1904) and Die 
hellenistischen Mysterienreligionen (1910). 

The real origins of the gnosis, he finds, go back at least as 
far as to the period of the first Persian Empire. Of its various 
elements, he himself lays most stress on compositions which 
he attributes to Egyptian priests or prophets who wrote in 
Greek but had command of a genuine basis of native theology. 
Evidence for the existence of a varied literature of this kind 
is found in what are called the "magical papyri," which have 
come to light abundantly in recent years. Through its points 
of contact with these, the "Hermetic" literature, so much 
studied at the Renaissance, but since neglected as the product 
of a late "syncretism," again acquires special importance. 
In this, it now appears from comparative study, there is a 
nucleus that had taken form probably in the first years of the 
Christian era. It therefore derived at the start nothing from 
Christianity. Of influence from Christianity or from Neo- 
Platonism at a later time there is very little. Christianity, in 
Reitzenstein's view, though it gave practically nothing, re- 
ceived much from the gnosis that sprang out of the mystery- 
religions; but Neo-Platonism stood out, as is seen especially 



220 APPENDIX 

in the treatise of Plotirms against the Gnostics, not distinc- 
tively against Christian positions incidentally touched, but 
for methodical thought in opposition to the revelations of 
prophets in general. Now the literary mode of those who 
speak in the name of "thrice-great Hermes" is that of pro- 
phetic revealers. Some use of a terminology derived from the 
philosophic schools is not to be denied to the writers of the 
gnosis, Hermetic and other; but it was used to translate into 
Hellenistic form ideas Eastern in their source. These, Reit- 
zenstein is careful to point out, were in part Persian and in 
part Chaldaean, and not exclusively Egyptian. That he 
should himself see, above all, the Egyptian elements, he with 
great impartiality ascribes to bias derived from his own 
studies 1 . On the philosophic side, Reitzenstein finds that the 
Stoic Posidonius (c. 130-46 B.C.) approximated most to the 
Hellenistic theosophy, and had a powerful influence on the 
development, in later antiquity, of religious philosophy and 
philosophical religion. Still, whatever this may have been, it 
remains clear, from Reitzenstein's own conclusions, that the 
contact of philosophy and gnosis was mainly external. Each, 
in taking over ideas or terms from the other, supplied the 
order of connexion from its own tradition ; and the traditions 
were different. 

For the gnosis was not primarily disinterested search for 
truth, scientific or philosophical. The phrase was, in full, 
"knowledge of God" (yvcocris deov), and this knowledge had 
such objects as material prosperity or protection from 
"demons." A safe passage into the invisible world, it was 
thought, could be secured by means of sacred formulae like 
those of the old Egyptian religion. Rebirth (irakiyyeveaia) 
was supposed to be conferred by rites of baptism (called in 
the Epistle to Titus, iii. 5, the Xovrpov irakvyyeveaias). The 
astrological fatalism that had come from Babylonia was felt 
as an actual oppression, and deliverance from it was sought 
through the aid of a higher power than the planetary spirits 
(the tcoo-fiofcparopes of the Pauline demonology). Here the 

1 The future historian of Gnosticism, however much the general position 
may have been modified, will have to do justice to Matter's breadth of view. 
In trying to bring everything under the formula of "eclecticism," which 
dominated French philosophy in his time, he was all-inclusive in his attitude 
to the sources. Among these, he did not fail to see the peculiar importance 
of Egypt; and, in Book i. chap. 10("Origines Chretiennes"), while treating 
Christianity as "the most direct element of Gnosticism," he in effect proves 
by examination of the New Testament that the gnosis was prior. 



APPENDIX 221 

readiest illustrations occur in the New Testament : but it was 
the recipient, not the source, of the Gnostic ideas ; which were 
not distinctively either Jewish or Christian, but belonged to 
a wider movement in which the Judaeo-Christian tradition 
was only one current. 

The Egyptian gnosis had its revealer in the god Thoth, 
translated as Hermes, with the epithet " Trismegistus." Here, 
according to Reitzenstein, was the source, not indeed of the 
term Logos in Philo, but of its "hypostasis 1 ." In reality, 
Philo's A 070? was a god, identical originally with Thoth or 
Hermes, the Word of God or of the gods. Only from this 
implicit Egyptian element can his phraseology about the 
Logos be explained in its detail. His interpretations of 
Hebrew revelation by means of Greek philosophy are thus 
determined by an idea that came to him from his Alexandrian 
environment. 

Another name of the revealing god in the Hellenistic 
Egyptian theology is Nov?, whence the "Hermetic religion" 
was sometimes called, in its own documents, "the religion of 
the mind." Of an origin not Egyptian, though the name is 
found in the Hermetic books, is the god "AvOpooiro^. The 
relations of this conception to the phraseology of the New 
Testament Reitzenstein does not fail to notice. In all these 
cases, the Greek names, he holds, are not the expression of 
artificial deifications, but are renderings of the names of 
ancient deities known in the popular religions, and now re- 
garded as revealing their true nature to chosen devotees. 

How far these explanations will carry the theory of religious 
origins remains to be seen. Clearly they do not essentially 
affect the history of philosophy. For example, there may be 
something of Egyptian gnosis lurking behind Philo's explicit 
reasoning; but (with very imperfect knowledge) I am inclined 
to think that he will remain for the history of thought a kind 
of Jewish scholastic, mediating between philosophy and 
official religion 2 . Again, "Avdpayjros, the Heavenly Man, or 
the Idea of Man, is to be found, more or less prominently, in 

1 This expression is not taken over from Neo-Platonism, for which it means 
no more than "existence" and has no special technical significance. It was 
through application to the Persons of the Christian Trinitj' that it gave origin 
to the modern philosophical phrase, "to hypostasise," that is, to set up as a 
being marked off from other beings (cf . Vacherot as cited p. 34, n. 1 ). 

2 Thus, while drawing attention here to Reitzenstein's view, I have retained 
in Chapter IV the usual explanation of Philo's Logos from Greek philo- 
sophical sources. 



222 APPENDIX 

Proclus, in John Scotus Erigena, in the Arabian philosophy, 
in the Homo Noumenon of Kant, perhaps in Comte's Human- 
ity. If, however, it came into the philosophical systems re- 
motely from without, this is only a matter of minute historical 
curiosity. The rational place and value of the idea can be 
studied without reference to any source it may have had out- 
side the philosophical tradition, or even outside the particular 
system 1 . 

As regards philosophical terminology, one point remains 
quite firmly established ; the effect of the newer investigations 
being only to show that that which was thought to be a dis- 
tinctively Judaeo- Christian usage is more general, and be- 
longed originally to the "heathen" gnosis. Siebeck, in his 
Geschichte der Psychologies has traced the modification in the 
meaning of the word "spirit" (irvev^a) to the influx of 
Hebrew religious conceptions ; and, though this is too limited 
a view, his genealogy of the later philosophical notion (patristic 
and scholastic) is essentially unaffected by the limitation. 
He found that in the Pauline language Trvev/xa is the term for 
the higher part of the soul, and Trvev^aTLKoiiov the illuminated. 
The terms in this sense, we now know, were gnostic; and in- 
deed Siebeck traced the usage in those historically known 
Gnostics who claimed to be the successors of Paul. Our trans- 
lation of the terms is "spirit" and "spiritual"; and this con- 
veys their meaning, though with a metaphysical implication 
brought in later than the gnostic period. For, in the tradition 
of Greek science, Trvevfia was never a name for the higher part 
of the soul. This was called not spirit but mind (vovs), as in 
Aristotle's psychology. Spirit, retaining its primary sense of 
breath, was always a material principle. Sometimes, in terms 
of a kind of materialism, it was identified with the soul (yjrvxv) 5 
sometimes it was conceived as a subtler fiery element between 
gross matter and the pure soul; but it was never applied dis- 
tinctively to the soul's higher part or aspect 2 . An early modern 
usage continuous with this, is when "animal spirits" were 
conceived as the soul's instrument for moving the limbs. For 

1 It was a shrewd remark of Jowett that every philosopher must be 
interpreted by his own writings. 

2 In the Axiochus, 370 c, there seems to be a trace of influence from the 
phraseology of the gnosis; though the turn given to the thought is Hellenic. 
The great works and the speculative discoveries of man, it is said, would have 
been impossible were there not some truly divine spirit in his soul (el fiy tl 
delov ovrus ivrjv irvevjxa. ry ^vxv)- Compare 371 a, where Socrates is made to 
cite a revelation of the future life from a certain Gobryes, dvijp fidyot. 



APPENDIX 223 

the Gnostics, the questions answered by the different philo- 
sophical views scarcely existed. Their thought was meta- 
physically vaguer, and did not concern itself with such dis- 
tinctions of the schools. It was sufficient for them that 
"spirit" could be regarded as an emanation of deity, a kind 
of influx that raised the soul above the level of a mere ani- 
mating principle, and fitted it to become the recipient of a 
religious revelation. In the meantime, the Neo-Platonic move- 
ment had carried on the intellectual analysis and completely 
dematerialised the conceptions both of "soul" and "mind." 
The later patristic writers, therefore, proceeding from the 
religious usage of their own tradition, Judaeo-Christian and 
remotely gnostic, on the one side, and from the science of the 
Greek schools on the other, gave a purely immaterial sense 
to "soul" and "spirit"; identifying the irvevixa of their own 
tradition with vovs as conceived by Neo-Platonism. This is 
the true source of the predominant meaning of "spirit" in 
those modern languages that possess equivalents for all the 
three terms. Soul, spirit and mind being all alike conceived 
as immaterial, "spirit" differs from "mind" only by a shade 
of connotation. In English at least, which has here a vocabu- 
lary precisely corresponding to the Greek, the stress is on 
emotion and will rather than on intellect, for which the term 
" mind " is the native equivalent. This implication of " spirit " 
comes from the gnostic and, more definitely, from the Judaeo- 
Christian side ; while the immateriality comes from Neo-Pla- 
tonism, mediated by the later Fathers and by the Schoolmen. 
Historically, as we see in this particular case, orthodox 
Christianity presents itself as in a manner a compromise be- 
tween Greek philosophy and Oriental gnosis. Yet in one 
respect the extremes have more in common than either of 
them has with the mean. While the Fathers of the Church 
were more Western than the Gnostics in their use of the 
methods elaborated in the philosophic schools, their notion 
of the "Catholic Church" separated them at once from those 
who appealed ultimately to rational tests and from those who 
claimed personal illumination by a revealing God. Philosophy 
and gnosis were alike expressions of intellectual or spiritual 
liberty. The system of compromise wrought out under the 
Catholic idea aimed at establishing one rule of faith for the 
many and the few, to be coercively enforced as soon as it had 
brought over the imperial despotism to its side. Thus its 
triumph involved the "heretical" communities of Gnostics 
and the independent philosophic schools in the same ruin. 



224 APPENDIX 

Yet, as Matter showed in his History, persecution by the 
same power never brought them together. It is true that the 
later Neo-Platonists were not unfriendly to the idea of reve- 
lations and inspirations of prophets, and were fond of quoting 
Chaldaean and Zoroastrian Oracles; and it is true that the 
Eastern gnosis was influenced from a very early period by 
Plato; but the gnosis, if it may be called in its own manner a 
philosophy, was a philosophy of separate type. This separate- 
ness continued in the Middle Ages, when the reappearance of 
popular heresies related to Gnosticism, and the revived know- 
ledge of ancient philosophy, leading to heterodoxy in the 
schools, though coincident in time, were on the whole as 
external to one another as the gnosis and the academical 
philosophy of antiquity. 

The last revival of the gnosis, after it had been suppressed, 
along with the teaching of Hellenic philosophy, by the 
Orthodox Byzantine Emperors, seems to have been in the 
movement of the Albigenses of Languedoc, to whom it had 
been carried by the dispersed Manichaeans and "Paulicians" 
of the East. In the early years of the thirteenth century, it 
was trampled out in the Crusade organised against it by Pope 
Innocent III, and finally crushed in detail by the centralised 
Dominican Inquisition which became the perfected form of 
ecclesiastical discipline under the Papacy. Its only possible 
later survival seems to be, as I have conjectured, among the 
heterodox religious sects of modern Russia. 

In the first edition, I indulged in the speculation that, 
starting again from thence, it may still have a future. The 
conclusion to which later investigation of origins has led 
seems to render this at least highly improbable. For it 
appears that, so far as there is a relation between the gnosis 
and orthodoxy, Christian or post- Christian Gnosticism is not 
the result of a vaporisation of historical faith, but, on the 
contrary, orthodox dogma is a concretion of the earlier gnosis. 
The movement in this direction having culminated in one 
rigorous and powerful type, it can hardly be repeated with 
a similarly successful result. Against a new divine story, 
there would not only be the old with its prestige, but the 
immense modern development of philosophy and criticism on 
the basis of verifiable science, with searchlights penetrating 
every corner of the world. Thus I find myself obliged to 
acquiesce in the view of Matter, that the last vestiges of 
Gnosticism as a living faith were destroyed in the mediaeval 
persecutions. Science and philosophy could reflourish, and 



APPENDIX 225 

could look forward to an ever-expanding life, when the 
Western theocracy had been broken by religious schism ; but 
the wandering speculations of the Gnostics remain only in- 
teresting fragments, curiously suggestive sometimes by an 
audacity that goes beyond that of regular philosophising, but 
offering no outlook either for hope or fear that they should 
grow together into a new organised religion. 

III. Iamblichus and Proclus on Mathematical Science 

For the theory of knowledge, the views of the later Neo- 
Platonists on mathematics are still not without interest even 
to students of Kant. An outline of some of the positions taken 
up may be found in the book of Iamblichus on the Common 
Science of Mathematics 1 , and in the two Prologues of Proclus 
to his Commentary on the first book of Euclid's Elements 2 . 
Of these Prologues, the first coincides in subject with the 
treatise of Iamblichus ; dealing with that which is common to 
arithmetic and geometry, and prior to all special departments 
of mathematics. The second is an introduction to the general 
theory of geometry and to Euclid's Elements in particular, and 
gives in its course a brief chronicle of the history of the science 
to the time of Euclid. The first Prologue draws from the same 
sources as the work of Iamblichus, setting forth views that 
had gradually taken shape in the schools of Plato and Aris- 
totle. In the case of one theory at least in the second, Proclus 
seems to lay claim to originality. In other cases, he mentions 
incidentally that he is only selecting a few things from what 
earlier writers have said. Iamblichus is professedly expound- 
ing the ideas of the " Pythagorean philosophy." 

The starting-point with both writers is the position of Plato 
at the end of the sixth book of the Republic. The objects of 
mathematics and the faculty of understanding (htdvoia) that 
deals with them come between dialectic and its objects above, 
and sense-perception and its objects below. Being thus inter- 
mediate, are mathematical forms and the reasonings upon 
them derivatives of sense-perception, or are they generated 
by the soul? In the view most clearly brought out by Proclus, 
they result from the productive activity of the soul, but not 
without relation to a prior intellectual norm, conformity to 

1 Iamblichi de Communi Mathematica Scientia Liber, ed. N. Festa, 1891. 
(Teubner.) 

2 Prodi Diadochi in Primum Euclidis Elementorum Librum Commentarii, 
ex rec. G. Friedlein, 1873. (Teubner.) 

w. 15 



226 APPENDIX 

which is the criterion of their truth. What is distinctive of 
Proclus is the endeavour to determine exactly the character 
of this mental production. Iamblichus does not so specially 
discuss this, but lays stress on the peculiar fixity of relations 
among the objects of mathematics. Mathematical objects are 
not forms that can depart from their underlying matter, nor 
yet qualities, like the heat of fire, which though actually in- 
separable can be thought of as taken away. The forms that 
constitute number and extension have a coherence which does 
not admit of this kind of disaggregation, whether real or ideal. 

According to the view made specially clear by Iamblichus, 
mathematical science does not take over its employment of 
division and definition and syllogism from dialectic. The 
mathematical processes to which these terms are applied are 
peculiar to mathematics. From itself it discovers and perfects 
and elaborates them; and it has tests of its own, and needs no 
other science towards the order of speculation proper to it. 
Its difference from dialectic is that it works with its own 
assumptions, and does not consider things "simply," without 
assumptions 1 . As Proclus also says, there is only one science 
without assumptions (avvrroOeros). No special science demon- 
strates its own principles or institutes an inquiry about them. 
Thus the investigator of nature (o <j>vcrio\6yo<;) assumes that 
there is motion, and then sets out from that determinate 
principle; and so with all special inquirers and practitioners 2 . 

Both writers, while they make considerations about the 
practical utility of knowledge subordinate, yet repeatedly 
draw attention to the applications, direct and indirect, of 
mathematics to the arts of life. Proclus cites Archimedes as 
a conspicuous example of the power conferred by science 
when directed to practical invention. And science in general, 
as both he and Iamblichus insist, derives its necessity from 
the mathematical principles on which it depends. The per- 
ception of the peculiar scientific importance of mathematics, 
grounded in the necessity of its demonstrations, they ascribe 
to Pythagoras ; who, as both declare in almost the same terms, 
brought it to the form of a liberal discipline. By this is meant 
that, instead of treating it as a collection of isolated pro- 

1 De Comm. Math. Scientia, pp. 89-90: d<p J eavrijs ovv evpiaicei re avra /cat 
reXeiot ko.1 4%€pydfcTcu, rd re oiKeta avrrj /caXcDs olde doKi/j.dfriv, teal ov Setrat olXXt/s 
iiri<XT7ifj.ris wpbs tt]v olicdav deoiplav. oil yap to cnr\us Kadairep rj diaXeKTLKrj, dXXd 
rd v(f>' eavrijv dLayivwaicei, oineiws tc avra dewpei Kadbcov avrrj vrroKeiTai. 

2 Prologus n., p. 75. 



APPENDIX 227 

positions, each discovered for itself, Pythagoras began to 
impress on it the systematically deductive character which 
it assumed among the Greeks. In the order of genetic develop- 
ment, men turn to knowledge for its own sake when the care 
about necessary things has ceased to be pressing 1 . 

The classification of the mathematical sciences given in the 
two treatises is the same. First in order comes the " common 
mathematical science" which sets forth the principles that 
form a bond of union between arithmetic and geometry. The 
special branches of mathematics are four : namely, arithmetic, 
geometry, music, and spherics (afyaupLicr}). Music is a deriva- 
tive of arithmetic ; containing the theory of complex relations 
of numbers as distinguished from the numbers themselves. 
Spherics is similarly related to geometry; dealing with abstract 
motion prior to the actual motion of bodies. To beginners it 
is more difficult than astronomy, which finds aid in the obser- 
vation of moving bodies; but as pure theory it is prior 2 . Next 
come the various branches of mixed mathematics, such as 
mechanics, optics, astronomy, and generally the sciences that 
employ instruments for weighing, measuring and observing. 
These owe their less degree of precision and cogency to the 
mixture of sense-perception with pure mathematical demon- 
stration. Last in the theoretic order come simple data of per- 
ception brought together as connected experience {ifjuireipia). 

The ground of this order is to be found in the rationalistic 
theory of knowledge common to the school. As Proclus re- 
marks, the soul is not a tablet empty of words, but is ever 
written on and writing on itself — and moreover, he adds, 
written on by pure intellect which is prior to it in the order 
of being. Upon such a basis of psychology and consequent 
theory of knowledge, he goes on to put the specific question 
about geometrical demonstration and the activity of the soul 
in its production. How can geometry enable us to rise above 

1 Prologus I., p. 29 : teal yap iraaa i) yeveens /cat r\ £j> avrrj arpecpo/xevrj ttjs \f/vxv* 
far) TrecpvKev dirb rod areXovs ets to rekeiov xwpeti'. Cf . 'ZtolX' ©eoX. 45. 

2 With the substitution of astronomy for "spherics," the four Pythagorean 
sciences of Iamblichus and Proclus form the "quadrivium," or second division 
of the " seven liberal arts," of mediaeval tradition. (The " trivium," according 
to the list usually given, comprises grammar, dialectic and rhetoric. ) A more 
curious point of contact is the identity of the conception of "spherics" — 
simply as classification of science and apart from philosophical theory of 
knowledge — with Comte's "rational mechanics," regarded by him as the 
branch of mathematics immediately prior to astronomy, which is the first of 
the physical sciences. 

15—2 



228 APPENDIX 

matter to unextended thought, when it is occupied with ex- 
tension, which is simply the result of the inability of matter 
to receive immaterial ideas otherwise than as spread out and 
apart from one another? And how can the hiavoia, proceed- 
ing as it does by unextended notions, yet be the source of the 
spatial constructions of geometry? The solution is that geo- 
metrical ideas, existing unextended in the Btdvoca, are pro- 
jected upon the "matter" furnished by the cj^avracrla. Hence 
the plurality and difference in the figures with which geo- 
metrical science works. The idea of the circle as understood 
(in the Scdvoia) is one ; as imagined (in the (pavraa la) it is many ; 
and it is some particular circle as imagined that geometry 
must always use in its constructions. At the same time, it is 
not the perceived circle (the circle in the alcrdriais) that is the 
object of pure geometry. This, with its unsteadiness and 
inaccuracy, is the object only of applied geometry. The true 
geometrician, while necessarily working by the aid of imagina- 
tion, strives towards the unextended unity of the under- 
standing with its immaterial notions. Hence the disciplinary 
power of geometry as set forth by Plato 1 . According to this 
view, those are right who say that all geometrical propositions 
are in a sense theorems, since they are concerned with that 
which ever is and does not come into being; but those also 
are right who say that all are in a sense problems, for, in the 
way of theorems too, nothing can be discovered without a 
going forth of the understanding to the "intelligible matter" 
furnished by the imagination, and this process resembles 
genetic production 2 . The division once made, however, the 
theoretic character is seen not only to extend to all but to 
predominate in all. 

1 In his theory of "geometrical matter," Proclus remarks, he has taken the 
liberty of dissenting from Porphyry and most of the Platonic interpreters. 
See Prologus n., pp. 56-7: irepl /xev odv rrjs yew/JLerpLKrjs vkrjs roaavra ?x o / J ' €v 
\eyeiv ovk ayvoovvres, oca Kal 6 0i\6cro0os ILop(pvpios iv rots avfx,/jUKTois yiypa<pev 
Kal oi irXeicrroi rdv HXaruviKQv diararrovrai, crv/xcpuvorepa be elvai ravra rais 
yew/merpiKais e065ois vofilfavres Kal ri2 TLXdrcovc dtavoyra koXovvtl rd viroKeifieva 
rrj yeoj/xerpia. cvvadei yap odv ravra dWifjXois, ftibri rwv yeufierpixCbv eldQv ai p.ev 
atrial, nad as Kal 77 didvoia irpo^dXXei rds dirodei^eis, iv avrrj Trpoiicpeo'TriKaaiv. avra 
de eKaara ra 8iacpo6/j.€va Kal crvvridifxeva o~xyi xaTa ""^P* T V V <pavrao*iav irpofiifiX-qrai. 

2 Prologus n., pp. 77-79. 



THE COMMENTARIES 
OF PROCLUS 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 

The view usually taken of Proclus might be summed up in 
an epigram to the effect that philosophies die of too much 
method. This is, on the whole, the view of Zeller, who, while 
expressing the deepest admiration for the organising work of 
the last great Neo-Platonist, finds that work in detail un- 
inspiring because essentially deprived of philosophic freedom 
through its combination of formal deduction with subordina- 
tion to the authority of tradition. In fact, it seems to him a 
kind of scholastic theology, not indeed wholly anticipating 
the spirit of the Western schoolmen, for it was still Greek, but 
forming the appropriate transition from Greek antiquity to 
the Middle Ages. 

There are obvious elements of truth in this view. Proclus 
is undoubtedly characterised by a finish of logical method in 
which he excelled all his predecessors. In Plotinus the in- 
tuitive reason predominates, in Proclus the discursive reason. 
On the formal side, this was the principle of Scholasticism, as 
authority was its principle on the material side. And Proclus, 
though free to reject the authority of his texts if reason is 
against them, does not in fact cut himself loose at any critical 
point from the meaning that he thinks can be educed from 
Plato. It is undeniable that in his age, for the philosophers 
of the Hellenic tradition, Homer and Plato had become a 
kind of sacred scriptures, with Orphic poems and Chaldaean 
oracles for apocryphal addenda. Yet the implied analogy is 
misleading. Although Neo-Platonism had in a manner in- 
corporated such distinctly religious movements of antiquity 
as Orphicism and Neo-Pythagoreanism, the philosophical in- 
terest remained dominant to the last. Proclus unquestionably 
regarded himself, in perfectly clear distinction at once from 
theologians like the Orphics and from men of science like 
Ptolemy, as a philosopher of the succession of Plato and 



232 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLTJS 

Plotinus 1 . Now in Scholasticism the philosophical interest 
was never supreme. And, on the formal side, Proems, with 
all his method and system, remains much more literary, and 
is never so boimd to his texts, even in the minutest expositions, 
that he cannot leave the track of direct deduction. He is also 
much more in contact with actual science, mathematical, 
astronomical and physical. It may be said with truth, how- 
ever, that he fixed the philosophical method of the schoolmen, 
and that this fixation was only reinforced by the later domin- 
ance of Aristotle. The method was that dialectical or dis- 
cursive reasoning which goes back to Socrates and Plato as 
its most accomplished representatives, and assumes its com- 
pleted scientific form in the Aristotelian syllogism. To recog- 
nise this may help us to understand the relative justification 
of the procedure both of the later Neo-Platonism and of 
mediaeval Scholasticism. 

If too much method is at last fatal to progress, too little 
means intellectual anarchy. This became visible to Athenian 
thinkers at the end of the first period of Greek philosophy 
with its divergent development of conflicting principles. It 
again became visible to the initiators of modern philosophy 
after the chaotic mixture of old and new thought at the 
Renaissance. Bacon and Descartes saw that, whether the 
distinctive watchword was to be reason or experience, the 
immediately pressing need was to determine the method of 
seeking truth. The paths then struck out were certainly the 
beginning of a new age of ordered progress. If we have since 
been warned against a new anarchy, this is not any too 
audacious flight of intellect, but the "dispersive specialism" 
that never leaves the parts to deal with the whole. To 
counteract this in its turn, perhaps the best remedy is the 
study of some all-comprehensive system, modern or ancient, 
positivist or idealist, the system of Comte or the system of 
Proclus. Such study is not only astringent but also emanci- 
pating. For the modern anarchy of endless specialism is an 

1 In one place, he comes very near to the actual name, Neo-Platonist. See 
Comm. in Tim., ed. Diehl, ii. 88, 12: tuv veurrepwv oi dwb ILkwrivov Travres 
nXoTwz/i/cot. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLTTS 233 

anarchy without liberty. It means that industrialism has led 
science captive. A renewed sense of wholeness is at the same 
time a renewed sense of freedom. 

No more in the case of Proclus than of Comte or Hegel, 
however, is the interest merely that of systematic grasp. 
A sufficient idea of his schematism, I think, has been given 
by the exposition of his fundamental and probably quite 
early treatise, the STo^eteoo-t? SeoXoyitcTj. What remains is 
to furnish evidence that he was not only a great systematiser 
but a deep-going original thinker. It was the fatality of being 
born in the fifth century that made him unable to bring out 
his most remarkable thoughts except by writing huge com- 
mentaries. For there is in fact more originality of detail in 
his commentaries on Plato than in his systematic treatises. 
Their distinctive interest is in the flashing out of new thoughts 
from the ancient setting, not in the light they throw on earlier 
thought, though this is of course not negligible. The age of 
erudition made subservient to the storing up of ancient 
science did not fully arrive till the sixth century, the time of 
the commentators like Simplicius, for whom the old world 
was visibly as dead as the new was unborn. 

With the exposition in Chapter IX as a clue to the outlines 
of the system, the points to be brought out will take their 
places as parts of an organic structure. The Commentaries 
that I shall give an account of are now all accessible without 
going back to old editions not easily procurable. In my refer- 
ences, I shall follow the pagination of the most recent texts 1 . 

1 I append a list of the editions used : 

Prodi Philosophi Platonici Opera Inedita, 2nd ed., Cousin. Paris, 1864. 
[This contains, besides the Life by Marinus, (1) the three works that exist 
only in the mediaeval Latin translation: De Decern Dubitationibus circa 
Providentiam ; De Providentia et Fato et eo quod in nobis, ad Theodorum, 
Mechanicum; De Malorum Subsistentia; (2) the Commentary on the First 
Alcibiades; (3) the Commentary on the Parmenides; (4) the Hymns.] 

Prodi Diadochi in Platonis Rem Publicam Commentarii, ed. W. Kroll. 
2 vols. Leipzig, 1899, 1901. 

Prodi Diadochi in Platonis Timaeum Commentaria, ed. E. Diehl. 3 vols. 
Leipzig, 1903, 1904, 1906. 

Prodi Diadochi in Platonis Cratylum Commentaria, ed. G. Pasquali. 
Leipzig, 1908. [Of this Commentary there remain only selections preserved 
in Scholia.l 



234 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 

The chronological order of the works of Proclus, through 
the existence of cross-references, cannot be treated as quite 
certain; but, of those to be dealt with circumstantially, I take 
the order to be: Commentaries on the Timaeus 1 , Parmenides, 
First Alcibiades, Republic. This is of course an impossible 
order of exposition. The logical order, corresponding to that 
which was adopted in Chapter V for the system of Plotinus, 
is : First Alcibiades, Parmenides, Timaeus, Republic. We thus 
begin with psychology, the centre of the system; next we go 
on to theory of knowledge, ontology and cosmology; lastly 
to the aesthetic and practical aspects of philosophy. Of course, 
in following approximately the order of the commentaries, it 
will be impossible to keep these divisions of the subject- 
matter exact. 

But first, by way of introduction, a few points may be 
brought together from the comparatively popular treatises on 
Theodicy which we possess in William of Morbeka's trans- 
lation. From the Scholiast's notes of the Commentary on the 
Cratylus, one or two details of interest for the Neo-Platonic 
interpretation of mythology can be appropriately added. 
After these preliminaries, the way will be clear for the ex- 
position of the larger works. 

An important innovation on Plotinus in statement is the 
rejection of the position that Matter is evil. Evils are the 
result of conflict in the world of birth. This world involves 
destruction, decay and death; but it was necessary that such 
a world should exist for the perfection of the whole ; and of its 
existence matter, or infinite possibility, was a necessary con- 
dition. Against making matter in itself evil, the doctrine of 
Plotinus himself is urged, that there cannot be two principles. 
It is allowed that there are apparent differences of doctrine in 
Plato 2 ; but the Philebus is found to be decisive against making 

1 The Commentary on the Timaeus is known from the biography of 
Marinus to have been finished when Proclus was twenty-eight; but its extant 
form is no doubt a later edition. It was his own favourite among his com- 
mentaries. 

2 De Malorum Subsistentia, 233-234. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLTTS 235 

either body or matter evil 1 . Matter cannot be the cause of the 
fall of souls, for it does not explain the different inclinations 
of different souls. The cause of descent to birth pre-exists in 
the soul itself as a certain necessity of alternation between the 
life of intellect and the life of its irrational part 2 . There is no 
principle of evil 3 . Evil is always incidental to the pursuit of 
some good 4 . 

This is clearly an improvement on Plotinus in formal state- 
ment, conveying much better the essential optimism of his 
doctrine; for his actual account of evils does not differ from 
that of Proclus. Nor does his account of the origin of matter 
essentially differ 5 . Matter, according to Plotinus, is directly 
produced, just as in the theory of Proclus, by the infinity that 
the One creates (iroLet). And Proclus agrees with Plotinus 
that it may be called in a sense evil as the ultimate stage of 
the descent of beings 6 . It is, however, also in a sense good as 
being the condition for the kind of good that exists in our 
world. Distinctively, it is to be called neither good nor evil, 
but only necessary 7 . 

But what is the meaning of "creation" by the One? It 
means, for both philosophers, essentially this: that without 
unity in and over the system of things there would be no par- 
ticular existence as an actually realised thing. It does not mean 
that abstract unity, without the latent existence of a many 

1 De Malorum Subsistentia, 236, 9-12: "Neque ergo corpus malum, neque 
materia : haec enim sunt Dei yevv-fj^ara, hoc quidem ut mixtura, haec autem 
ut infinitum." 

2 Ibid. 233, 21-26: "hoc erat ipsis malum qui ad deterius impetus et 
appetitus, sed non materia... et propter debilitatem patiuntur quae oportet 
tales pati male eligentes." 

3 Ibid. 250, 5-6: "Unam quidem itaque secundum se malorum causam 
nullatenus ponendum." 

4 Ibid. 254, 16-17: "boni enim gratia omne quod fit, fit." Cf. De Provi- 
dentia et Fato, 190, 31: "malum videtur bonum esse eligentibus ipsum." 

5 Zeller, iii. 2, p. 808, n. 3, finds a discrepancy ; but the quotation he gives 
from the Platonic Theology of Proclus is simply a paraphrase of Plotinus: 
irpbeiaiv oftv ical i) i)\r) kclI to viroKei/xevov twv o-wfiaTiov avudev airb tQv irpcoTicrcav 
apx&v, at 8t) dia irepiovalav 5vvdp.€U)S airoyevvav dvvavrat kcll to %cx aTOV T & v 
ovruiv. For the view of Plotinus, compare p. 68, n. 3, above. 

6 De Malorum Subsistentia, 238. Compare the position of Plotinus as 
stated above, p. 81. 

7 Cf . in Hemp. i. 37-38. 



236 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 

as it were in its own right, calls it from nothing into being. 
The many real beings have their individual eternity. Their 
"freedom," that which depends on themselves and makes 
possible for them moral fall or ascent, is this ultimate exis- 
tence of theirs. It could not indeed be anything actually 
without the One : the existence of an actual many without a 
common unity is unthinkable. And there is no bringing of 
chaos into order by a sort of accidental coming together of 
God and an independent Matter. Of all doctrines, the Neo- 
Platonists desire to be clear of this, precisely because it was 
defended by some who called themselves disciples of Plato. 
Hence the apparent stringency of their immaterialist monism. 
For a real understanding of their position, however, we must 
equally avoid attributing to them the ideas of volitional 
creation and of "pantheistic absorption." The many are 
never finally absorbed into the One; and therefore, on Neo- 
Platonic principles, there was never a time when they did 
not in some sense exist as a many. On this, Proclus is more 
explicit than Plotinus. 

I have deviated a little from direct exposition of the 
treatises; but it will be seen that this anticipation of later 
discussions has an important bearing on the metaphysics 
implied in them. Proclus is, of course, quite Platonic when he 
places goodness above intellect, and describes the soul that 
has it as desiring to benefit all and to make them, as far as 
possible, like itself. But here he finds one source of danger, 
— a danger inherent in the order of the world. For if, in 
descending to communicate the good which it possesses to the 
common life, the soul loses the intellectual mode of being 
which is its own highest state, this is a loss to it and so far an 
evil 1 . He admits no intrinsically evil soul; though souls may 
need long discipline by punishment. The maleficent soul of 
which the existence is suggested by Plato in the Laws, he 
takes to be no unitary being at all, but those irrational 
elements in each soul which, when they become preponderant, 
cause it to sink 2 . Not that they are in themselves evil: the 

1 De Malorum Subsistentia, 220-221. Cf. in Tim. iii. 324-325. 

2 De Malorum Subsistentia, 247-250. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLTJS 237 

evil consists in the want of due relation between the rational 
and the irrational activities. 

On the most obvious form of evil, the mutual destructions 
of men and animals, Plotinus, as we have seen, replies that 
they are necessary for the continued life of the universe and 
do not affect the reality of any soul. Men, in the gaiety with 
which they give their lives in battle, show that they have a 
divination of this truth 1 . His solution is in effect that of the 
celebrated passage in the Bhagavad-gita, where the god who 
accompanies the hero Arjuna explains to him that slaying or 
being slain is only illusory appearance 2 . Justice, he holds, is 
realised in the series of lives; but about the detail of this, if 
the general principle can be proved defensible, he is not 
curious. Here Proclus is not content with a merely general 
solution, but tries to furnish detailed answers to scepticism 
on the existence of a providential order. All the questions 
having been long debated, he had abundant speculative 
theodicy behind him 3 . So serious is he about the detail that 
he tries to determine what shadow of justice there may be in 
the lot of the lower animals 4 . Their lot, he seems to say, is 
partly in accordance with the qualities in them that resemble 
human virtues; but the effect of his reasonings on the subject 
is that, where there is not a rational soul, there is no per- 
manent individuality 5 . Animal souls may perhaps be under- 
stood as differentiations of the general life of nature under 
ideas of species only. If this is so, then animal life is to be 
considered as a necessary part of our world, linked to the 
higher parts in an order intelligible from the point of view of 



1 See above, p. 80. 

2 Compare Sir Alfred Lyall's Asiatic Studies, Second Series (1899), ch. i. 
p. 20. 

3 This becomes evident from a study of Origen's treatise Ilepi apxuv (ed. 
Koetschau, 1913). Origen adapts to Biblical stories exactly those pre- 
suppositions of Platonising theodicy which Proclus applies to the stories in 
Homer. 

4 Be Decern Dubitationibus, 118-125. 

5 Proclus often returns to the question about animal souls; but he always 
seems conscious of a final want of certainty in his own mind as to how far 
individuality is to be carried down the scale. 



238 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLTTS 

the whole, but not intelligible by itself 1 . Considered apart, it 
comes under the conception of Fate rather than of Provi- 
dence. 

This distinction, brought down the ages by Boethius 2 , is 
drawn with great subtlety by Proclus. The causes which we 
know only as mechanical or external are unknown to us in 
their essence: hence the appearance of blind fate. In the 
system of the whole, that which appears to us as mechanical 
necessity really follows intellect. The way in which it follows 
may be partly understood by tracing the higher order of 
intellectual causation through the order intermediate be- 
tween that and mechanism, viz., the vitality of nature as an 
internal principle 3 . Determination in the apparatus of the 
mechanician is not primarily in an arrangement of wheels and 
pulleys and so forth, but depends on an incorporeal pre-con- 
ception of the arrangement, working through mental imagina- 
tion and a living organism 4 . Proclus treats it as a paradox 
that a mechanical philosopher, who in his own investigations 
makes especial use of pure intellect, should think this ex- 
plicable as the result of sense inseparable from body 5 . His 
tone towards Theodorus, to whom the treatise on Providence 
was addressed, is, it may be noted, far more amicable than 
that of Plato to the mechanicists of his time. He recognises 
at the beginning that these questions will always be discussed 6 . 
Theodorus, he puts it playfully, thinks to honour his own art 
by making the author of the universe a mechanician 7 . Mental 
determinations, however, are not really explicable as last re- 

1 In the Commentary on the Parmenides (735, 15-24), it is said that while 
justice takes part in ordering things without life, these do not themselves 
participate in the just: a stick or a stone cannot be called just or unjust. 
The absence here of any reference to irrational animals accentuates the un- 
certainty in the discussion of them elsewhere. 

2 See Prof. W. P. Ker's Dark Ages, pp. 108-109. 

3 De Providentia et Fato, 155. 

4 Ibid. 194, 34-38: "Neque enim tua fixio, tympanis et tornis utens et 
materiis corporalibus, in tua praecognitione corporaliter erat ; sed ilia quidem 
incorporabiliter phantasia et vitaliter habuit futuri rationem." 

5 Ibid. 178. 

6 Ibid. 146, 14-16: "Quaeris autem millesies dicta quidem et neque 
requiem habitura unquam secundum meam opinionem." 

7 Ibid. 148, 19-23. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 239 

sultants of an all-comprehending succession of mechanical 
causes. We know mind and soul from within as of an in- 
trinsically different nature; and it is from these internally 
known intellectual and psychical causes that we must seek 
insight into the real order of the whole. 

For Proclus this implies more than that mechanism has an 
inner or psychical side. It means also that the metaphysical 
universe of mental realities is wider than the physical uni- 
verse. In the corporeal order, not only does appearance take 
the place for us of reality, but the reality that is manifested 
is itself a small part of the whole, not ultimately intelligible 
out of relation to the larger part. " Many things escape Fate; 
nothing escapes Providence 1 ." Fate is the destiny undergone 
by particular beings without insight into its true causes. With 
complete knowledge of reality, fate itself would be seen as 
part of providence. 

Thus it becomes a philosophical problem to understand as 
far as we may the scheme of cosmic justice. To solve the 
difficulty, why descendants suffer for the sins of their fore- 
fathers, Proclus brings in the idea of the solidarity of cities 
and races 2 . There is a vital influence along a certain line, 
sometimes producing close resemblance at long intervals. 
And souls are not associated with such and such races or 
cities by chance, but in accordance with their former deeds 
and their acquired characters 3 . This understood, the trans- 
mission of ancestral guilt or merit can be conceived as part 
of a system by which justice is realised for each individual 
also. This must not be tested simply by what appears ex- 
ternally. Some have deprived themselves of possessions for 
the love of virtue. How then can providence be blamed for 
treating the good as they treat themselves? Future fame is 
a compensation for present neglect 4 . Gifts of wealth and 
power, abused by the bad, bring punishment. And the bad 
are not outside the care of providence. If by such gifts they 

1 De Providentia et Fato, 149, 17-18. 

2 De Decern Dubitationibus, 136, 32-35: "Omnis civitas et omne genus 
unum quoddam animal est majori modo quam hominum unusquisque, et 
immortalius et sanctius." 

3 Ibid. 139, 3-6. 4 Ibid. 117-118. 



240 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 

are apparently made worse and then punished for their deeds, 
this is not only for some good to the whole, but for the good 
of the offenders. Latent dispositions to vice often cannot be 
cured unless they pass into act 1 . Only then can the repent- 
ance follow that is necessary for remedy. All souls are at some 
time curable. It would be inconsistent with the order of the 
universe that any being, among men or even demons, should 
be always evil 2 . 

The ruthlessness of the processes by which the cosmic order 
is sustained does not in the end trouble Proclus, as it did not 
trouble Plotinus. The heroic race, he says in one passage, is 
impelled by vehement phantasy and resolute will, not dis- 
tinctively by reason ; but this is its own nature, and is no more 
evil in itself than the ferocity of a lion or a panther. Thus the 
Whole makes use of heroes as instruments for correcting dis- 
orders; just as it makes use of beasts for devouring men, and 
of inanimate things for the purposes for which they are fitted 3 . 

I have given only a slight selection of topics from these 
little treatises. Their perennial interest will probably always 
gain for them some readers; and so, in the absence of the 
originals, one example of the singular mode of translation 
from Greek into Latin practised in the Middle Ages will be pre- 
served in living memory. In the Commentary on the Cratylus, 
one point which directly concerns mythology is of special 
interest for its bearing on the same topics. Apparently 
hostile chance or fortune is declared to be always finally 
beneficent destiny 4 . The particular event that we class under 
the head of chance may seem to go unguided; but in the total 
order generalised as Fortune there is nothing irrational. All 
is ordered, down to the destiny of the individual. Hence the 
deification of Fortune is philosophically justified. 

1 De Decern Dubitationibus, 113, 18-21. Cf. Be Mdlorum Subsistentia, 263, 
7-11. 

2 De Mdlorum Subsistentia, 214-215. 

3 Ibid. 217, 3-7. 

4 44, 8-13: fj.i] b-q tls tt\v tijxV v tclijttjv aXoytarov alriav rjyelado} kcu abpivrov 
(to yap ipyov avTijs eis vovv /3X^7ret), dXXd ddav ?) daifioviav dtivafuv, oidev acpetaav 
eprifJLOv Trjs otKeias i-maTaalas, dX\a iravra koX to. Z<rx aTa T & v evepyrjuaTuv rjfiQv 
Karevdijvovaav irpbs to ed ml wpbs tt)v tov wavTbs to^lv. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 241 

What most interested the Scholiast, and perhaps Proclus 
himself, in the Dialogue, was not the mingled scientific sug- 
gestiveness and irony of the discussion on language, but the 
interpretation of mythology. On scandalous myths, the usual 
view of the later Greek philosophy is stated, that the myth 
should be referred to a true intellectual meaning as its inner 
sense 1 . To the same god may be assigned different meanings 
in varied references 2 . Among the connexions of ideas sug- 
gested, it is interesting to come upon an exact summary by 
anticipation of Swinburne's Last Oracle. As the god that 
furnishes forth from himself the light of the visible world is 
called the Sun, so the god that furnishes forth from himself 
truth is called Apollo 3 . 

This is a rapid indication of developments that fill a con- 
siderable space in the writings of Proclus. In general, where 
these developments occur, I shall content myself with such 
indications. I find the allegorical interpretations of the 
myths agreeable to read; but, as no philosophical doctrine 
is ever educed from a myth except through being first read 
into it, little can be done with them for exposition. The serious 
part of the detailed theology of Proclus was the idea, touched 
on above, that the metaphysical is wider than the physical 
universe ; and that the beings of which it consists are not only 
human minds, but include hierarchies of intelligences beyond 
that of man. These take part in working out the providential 
order. They are called gods, angels, daemons and so forth, 
and are spoken of by the names of mythological personages ; 
but the stories about them are not taken to be even disguised 
accounts of historical events; so that Greek polytheism has 
in effect evaporated into philosophical fancies by which the 
abstract thought of Neo-Platonism, in full consciousness of 

1 55, 21-22 : ttjv (paLPo/xivrfv repaToKoyiav els iiriffTrj/JLOVLK^p 'ivvoiav avairifiTreiv. 
Cf . in Bemp. i. 80-81. The myths objected to by Socrates in the Republic have 
a mystical, not an educational aim ; and it is only — so Proclus argues — to their 
educational use that he objects. 

2 56, 3-6. Cf . 62, 24—27 : dWd tt&vtwu ovtwv kv Tra.cn Kal ck&cttov irdaas §x oUT0 ^ 
ras epepyeias, aXXos /car' dWrjv e£^x et /ca ' xard Tarjrrjv x aL P aKTr IP' t fr Tai SicupepdvTUis. 

3 78, 23—25: otl aiairep 6 to iyK6a/j.ioi> irdv <pus d0' eaxrrov xopyyw "HXto? 
KaXetTCU, outwj Kal 6 ttjv dXrjdeLav d(p' iavrov xopvyuv 'A7r6XXwv /caXetrcu. 

w. 16 



242 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 

what it is doing, strives to complete itself imaginatively. 
What Proclus called theology is a system of metaphysics 
running out at intervals into these fancies. 



ON THE FIRST ALCIBIADES 1 

The circumstantial account of the commentaries must begin 
with one that takes for its text a Dialogue assigned in modern 
times to the "Platonic apocrypha." Of late the controversy 
about this small group of writings has been revived. An 
exposition of Proclus is of course not the place for entering 
into the controversy; but not to offer a personal opinion, even 
when it has no authority, might seem an evasion of a question 
naturally asked. My conjecture about the present dialogue is 
that it was an early exercise in the Academy found to be of 
exceptional merit and therefore, with a few others of the kind, 
added as an appendix to the actual dialogues of Plato. This, 
I think, is something like Jowett's explanation of the way in 
which the apocryphal dialogues came to be preserved; and 
his final literary judgment was passed after consideration of 
all that Grote could say against any discrimination between 
genuine and spurious writings not already fixed by the uni- 
versal consent of antiquity. It remains to be seen whether 
the later defence, by undoubted experts, of the Epistles and 
other compositions generally rejected in recent times, will 
succeed where that of Grote failed in carrying with it the 
judgment of critical scholars. 

The First Alcibiades Proclus thinks an especially good intro- 
duction at once to philosophy and to Plato, because it begins 
with the problem of knowing oneself. The aim of the Dialogue 
is perfectly general, not directed only to the individual mind 
of Alcibiades, but concerned with the theory of human know- 
ledge; and with this primarily, not with any investigations 
beyond it or beside it 2 . For this is fundamental, the basis at 
once of the theory of our own being and of our ethical per- 
fection 3 . We cannot hope to succeed in determining the 

1 103a-116a. 2 292-293. 3 296. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 243 

nature of the known without first distinguishing the different 
kinds of knowledge 1 . 

All, says Proclus, is directed to the conclusion that man has 
his real existence in the soul 2 : the soul is the man. The ideal 
method is demonstration by irrefutable arguments 3 ; but 
much, it is allowed, is actually knowable only by the kinds of 
experience of which opinion and perception are the criteria 4 . 

The theory of knowledge developed by Proclus, we shall see 
later, centres in discursive reason. Intuition, higher or lower, 
is to be tested by its coherence in a ratiocinative system. 
Here he introduces an idea, not much developed elsewhere, 
though it occurs in the Platonic Theology 5 , that may have 
been suggested by the phrase tticttis a\r)9r)<; in the poem of 
Parmenides. To "belief" distinctively is assigned the grasp 
of reality at its summit. The order of existences, the good, 
the wise, the beautiful (Phaedrus, 246 e), has corresponding 
to it the triad of mental virtues, faith, truth, love (ir lares 
teal akijOeca teal epo)<;) 6 . 

Love is the principle at once of return to divine beauty and 
of the outgoing action by which this irradiates the world 7 . 
In its sense of benevolence, it has its part both in the ener- 
gising of the world-process and in the descent of souls to 
birth. Some descend to raise others. Thus Socrates and 
Alcibiades tend to become for Proclus figures in an allegory. 
Socrates is the "good daemon" to whose guardianship Alci- 
biades is assigned 8 . Again, Socrates is the soul's intellect 
(z/ou9T^9^u^7}?)andAlcibiadestherationalsoul(Xo7t^i/rL;^). 
There is a madness of love that is above the sobriety of 
prudence, as there is one that is below it 9 . Socrates, in being 
altogether exempt from passion, illustrates the providential 
direction of the lower by the higher order of causes. In this 
there is something divine or "daemonic" as contrasted with 
the providence exercised over more imperfect souls by others 

1 Cf. 394, 16—19: ttQs yap ovk cLtottov rfj (pixrei rdv yvojarQv ras rQv yvJiaeuv 
acpopifei.v 5ia0o/)ds, aXKa fxi] Tovvavriov rats tQiv yvdxrewu di.at.peiv; 

2 308, 9. 3 309, 8-14. 4 312-313. 

5 See above, pp. 162-3. 6 356-357. 7 325, 10-20. 8 340. 

9 352, 26-27 : r^j yap fxavias i] [x£v iari auxppoavvrjs Kpeirrcov, 7/ 5e airoTreTTTUKev 
air' avTTJs. 

16—2 



244 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 

that have had to descend into the perturbations of life to be- 
come the agents of this care 1 . 

Proclus turns to a more generalised discussion of the 
daemonic. The daemon or genius in each of us is not the 
rational soul, though Plato (Timaeus, 90 a) may have appear- 
ed to say so 2 . The view of Plotinus also must be rejected, that 
the daemon is the power next above that with which the soul 
energises in the present life 3 . In the view of Proclus as here 
stated, it is the whole destiny, or providential direction, of the 
individual life as a whole 4 . In Socrates himself, the daemon 
was analogous to Apollo, the rational discourse (X070?) to 
Dionysus; the function of the daemon being to check the 
exuberance of the Dionysiac impulsion 5 . 

Divine love is an action, not a passion 6 . The movement 
whereby the higher seeks to perfect the lower concurs with 
the movement of the lower seeking to be perfected, the former 
being only slightly anticipatory; whence some have thought 
that matter could organise itself 7 . Natural virtue, as Plotinus 
said, adumbrates its own perfection 8 . 

The innate abilities of Alcibiades, brought into relation 
with the choice made by the first soul in the myth of Er 
(Republic x. 619 bc), suggest to Proclus a position developed 
in more than one place in an especially interesting way. Souls 
from heaven aspire to despotisms 9 . The life of ambition is 
indeed higher than the common life, as was recognised by 

1 372. 2 383, 26-31. 

3 See above, pp. 96-7. 4 386-387. 

5 391. 

6 417, 1: 6 /xkv deios ipws evtpyeia iariv. Cf. Spinoza, Eth. v. Prop. 36: 
"Mentis amor intellectuals erga Deum... actio est." 

Another interesting point of contact between Spinoza and Neo-Platonism 
occurs in the Appendix to the first Part of the Ethics. Spinoza, though not, 
like Plotinus and Proclus, a teleologist, puts the necessity for lower grades of 
being in precisely the same way: "lis autem, qui quaerunt: cur Deus omnes 
homines non ita creavit, ut solo rationis ductu gubernarentur? nihil aliud 
respondeo, quam : quia eo non def uit materia ad omnia ex summo nimirum 
ad infimum perfectionis gradum creanda." 

7 422, 31-37. 

8 429, 1-3: 77 yap <pv(w<r) dperi] rotdSe ris iari' /ecu yap '6/j.p.a dreXes Kal rjdos 
^X €l >' Kara tov dttov IIXcotcVoj'. 

9 432. Cf. 403. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 245 

Plato (Gorgias, 523) 1 . It is, however, in the second place; as 
is seen in Alcibiades, who aims at honour and power before 
the good of his city. This is to seek a partial good in contest 
with others, instead of those goods of which no one has less 
because many share in them 2 . He thus shows himself inferior 
to Pericles, his kinsman and guardian, with whom among the 
rest he means to contend; for Pericles was accustomed to 
remind himself that he ruled over Greeks, over Athenians and 
over freemen. By this insatiability his life has the character 
of passion and not of reason 3 . Measureless ambition despises 
everything short of governing the whole world with absolute 
power in company with the gods, and, if not checked by 
knowledge, is capable of ruining mankind 4 . 

In the sequel to this discussion, we find a much-needed 
qualification of the modern maxim that knowledge is power. 
Power, indeed, cannot be acquired without knowledge; but 
there can be knowledge without power; for the addition of 
power depends on a concurrence of the whole and on presiding 
good fortune 5 . 

As God and Matter are alike in unlikeness, being without 
form and infinite and unknowable 6 , so also those who know 
and those who do not know but are not aware of their 
ignorance are alike in not seeking or learning. Of those who 
have come to know either by their own discovery or by being 
taught, it is rightly said that there was a time within their 
memory when they did not know; and yet no time can be 

1 433, 7-8 : did Kai 6 UXdroju e , ax aTOV X LT ^ va T ^ v r^ v X^ v direKaXei rr\v <f>i\o- 
ripiav. 

2 439, 1-5 : ra p.ev yap dp-ipiara twv dyad&v djxa. irXeioffi irapeivai duvarbv Kai 
ov8eis Fkarrov e'xei ire pi aura did ttjv d\\wv kttjctiv, to. 8e piepicrrd cr\)v iXarrujaecri 
tCjv dXXwv irapayiverai rots '4xov<xiv. The dpipio-ra are of course those goods of 
which it can be said "that to divide is not to take away." 

3 439, 27-30 : KadbXov yap elire'iv eKacrrov tQv iraddv dtrkpavrbv icrri icai d/xerpov, 
Xoyip fAT) Kparovpevov 6 yap Xbyos iripas earl, to de irddos dXoyov Kai dbpiarov. 

4 439-440. 

5 446, 21-27: iiriar-qpLrji p.ev yap x^pts oik &v ns ttjs dvvdpieios tvxoi' T ^ v 7<*P 
dyad&v rj divapiis, rd be dyada pier' eiriGT-qp.iis KTwpieda' irapo\io-r\% be eiri<TTrjp.r)s, 
davpaarbv otibev p.rf irapeivai ttjv Stivapav del yap Kai ttjs rod iravrbs avpiirvoias 
Kai ttjs dyadrji rtixv* T V S tovtuv irpoeaTi^irijs. 

s 473, 3-4: us yap i] vXrj dveldeos, Kai 6 debs' Kai 5r] Kai direipov eKdrepov Kai 
dyv ucttov. 



246 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 

assigned to the learning of certain notions such as the equal 
and the just. These apparently antithetic positions, says 
Proclus, have no real incompatibility; for while such notions 
have in the soul a bare existence to which no beginning in 
time can be assigned, the articulate knowledge of them, 
whether by learning or by discovery, dates from remembered 
times 1 . 

Justice, Proclus finds, is discovered through the fact of 
injustice which leads to war. This is from the point of view 
of the statesman, as distinguished from the soldier and the 
general, whose business is specialised action. The true states- 
man first tries to persuade the enemy, and only recurs to force 
when persuasion has failed. Socrates, it is observed, makes 
clear to Alcibiades that injustice is a more generalised con- 
ception than deceiving or doing violence or taking away a 
person's goods. The Stoics, indeed, declared all these things 
always wrong; but the poets and philosophers of an earlier 
time were more in accordance with the common sense of man- 
kind in regarding them as all justified in a variety of actual 
cases 2 . Justice and injustice, on the other hand, differ 
wholly, and are not capable of being good or bad according 
to circumstances. 

The proper end of war is justice, not victory. Enemies are 
to be made better. Of peace the good that is the end is 
greater; namely, friendship and unity, the positive com- 
pletion of all moral virtue, as was said by the Pythagoreans 
and Aristotle 3 . Later 4 , Proclus makes a triad of the good, the 

1 474, 12—28: birrf) ecTiruv ipvx&v t) yvQais, 7} p.tv dSidpdpwros kcll kclt evvoiav 
ipCkriv, t] be SL-qpdpw.uevr] xal iiriaTrjfxovi.Kr] teal dvap.(pLO-^rjT7]TOS....TT]S fiev odv nad' 
inrap^v iv 7\pXv £<tt<1)<T7I5 tQv elbQv ivvoias xP^os °& K ^ <JTl TrpoTjyoijfAevos' ef d'Cblov 
yap avrrjv el\rj(pap.ev ' tt)% be Kara irpo^oKijv nal bidpQpvxnv twv \bywv yvuaeu^ 
/ecu XP° V0V %X°l xev «7retf. olba yap on rb ptiv eibos rod kvk\ov ri iariv ifxaQov ev 
npBe rip XP° V V> T0 Se eTbos rrjs biKaio<rvvrj$ iv dWip, na\ ovtws e<p' etcdarov ruiv 
fvruv uv ray iici<TTi}p.as tear' ivepyeiav ?%o/xev. Cf. 514-515. There is here a 
distinct advance in discrimination not only on Plato but on Plotinus: see 
above, p. 51. 

2 496, 8-10: xai 6Xws dpeanei tovto ax^bbv diraai -reus dpx at ' otS Ka ^ V cvvqQeia 
<rvvop.o\oyel rr) bb^rj tQv iraXaiiav. Another opposition to a Stoic paradox may 
be noted: against the ascription of all passion to wrong opinion, the influence 
of feeling and will on opinion is recognised (550-551). 

3 500. * 575-578. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 247 

beautiful, the just. Beauty mediates between the wider 
notion of goodness and the more limited notion of justice. 
The underlying reality of the triad is one, but the terms in 
their explicit meaning differ 1 . Ultimately the political art, 
as it ought to be, is one with justice 2 . 

Citing from the Dialogue 3 the proof from wars that men in 
general cannot know accurately what is just and what is un- 
just, since it is precisely through differences of conviction on 
this point that they go to war, Proclus rejects the inference 
that they know nothing at all on the subject. These ex- 
tremest differences, provoking the extremest evils, indicate 
the priority of the notion in our minds. Because we have this 
so firmly fixed, and think ourselves right about the applica- 
tion, we fall into contentions such as do not arise in the case 
of health and disease, where we know that we do not know, 
and trust the experts 4 . In truth, men have the right notion 
innate in them: where error comes is in the application to 
particular circumstances. Moreover, justice and injustice are 
an affair of the whole of life : compared with them, questions 
of health and disease are only about the parts. These last we 
might even cast aside as questions that do not concern that 
in us which is of most value; but by nature we hold to the 
distinction between the just and the unjust as having here 
our very being. Deprived of justice, our life becomes to us a 
life in death and no longer a living reality 5 . 

1 577, 21-22: rd p.ev inroKelfxevov ev, ol 8£ \byoi 8id<popoi. 

2 501. 3 Alcib. I. 112. 

4 537, 21-28: trepl iiev yap tQv vyieipQv air\rjv exo/J.ev ayvoiav Kal tcr/xev oti 
ovk 'i<r/j.ev, kclv irpbs okiyov biepexQw/J-ev, rots rexviran tQv toioijtojv eiriTpeiroixev ' 
Trepl 5e tGjv biKaiuv olofxeda iiriaTrj/xoves elvai bid to \byovs 'ix uv o-vtwv ri)v ^vx'QV, 
Kal tovto olbfxevoi Kara <piaiv ov (SovKbfxeda irpoeadai to biKaiov. 

5 538, 3-9 : Kal vocubes Kal vyieivbv k&v trpboiTb tls, (is ov Trepl to TtfiuJoTaTOv 
yi.vouevr]s T7js (3\dp7)s' bLKalov be Kal dbiKOV /cara <ptio~iv dvTexbfMeda Travres, ws ri)v 
overlap rjfiwv iv ToiJTip a^fiTracrav e'x 0VT€ s ' fJ-bvov odv ovk dvotiaioi Kal veKpol Kal to 
fir} bv VTrdpxovTes vofxi^ofxev ylvecdai, ffTepb/J-evoL t<2v biKaiwv. 



248 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 

ON THE PARMENIDES* 

From the more elementary theory of knowledge with ethical 
applications, the transition comes appropriately to the more 
abstruse doctrine developed out of the Parmenides. The Com- 
mentary begins with a prayer to the gods for enlightenment. 
This prose hymn, detached from the context, has gained some 
celebrity as a composition. A translation is given in Maurice's 
Moral and Metaphysical Philosophy. There is here, as in many 
other places, a grateful recognition by Proclus of what he owes 
to his master Syrianus, who stands for him, among all his 
predecessors, next in authority to Plato 2 . 

The views of different commentators are first set forth. 
Some said the Dialogue was written merely for logical exercise, 
and as an illustration of method. Others insisted that the 
method was developed only for the sake of the theory of 
reality. Again, some took this reality to be the Being of 
Parmenides himself considered as One (ev 6v). Others found 
that Plato, in his series of distinctions, began with the One 
before Being; not all the assertions and denials being true of 
the One in the same sense. Syrianus, whom Proclus follows, 
decisively adopted the position of those who regarded the 
Dialogue as concerned with the theory of reality. This was 
in his view not only an ontology but a theology. The One is 
identical with God 3 . 

Proclus has some judicious remarks on the composition. 
The dry style (^apa/cr^p la"xy6$) 9 contrasting with that of the 
mythological poets, is, he points out, admirably adapted to 
the dialectical purpose 4 . In the poem itself of Parmenides he 
finds something of the same character 5 . 

He ingeniously reconciles the prohibition of dialectic to 
youth in the Republic with the commendation of it in the 
Parmenides to the youthful Socrates. The prohibition is a 

1 126 a-141 e. 

2 In this Commentary (1061, 24), the Homeric \o?ados aviip wpiaros (II. 
xxiii. 536) is applied to him. 

3 641, 10: debs /cat iv ravrov. Cf. 643, 1 : 6 yap Kara to £v debs ov tls 6ebs dAV 
a7rXa;s 6e6s. 

* 645-647. 5 665. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 249 

legislative decision for average natures ; the commendation is 
advice given in a small circle to an exceptional nature 1 . The 
kinds of dialectic he classifies into (1) mental gymnastic; 
(2) discovery of truth; (3) refutation of error. 

A dialogue of Plato is an organism. To treat the prologue 
as alien to the contents is incompatible with all critical judg- 
ment. The setting of the Parmenides must therefore first be 
considered in detail. 

The arrival of Cephalus at Athens from Clazomenae to hear 
from Antiphon the discourse of Parmenides symbolises the 
relations between the Ionic, the Italic and the Athenian 
philosophy. The Ionic philosophy dealt with nature as in 
flux, the Italic with stable ideal existences. The theories of 
these, which are both realities though of different orders, were 
brought together and completed by the mediation of Socrates 
and Plato. Accordingly, the Ionian comes to Athens to be 
initiated by an Athenian in what had been taught by the 
Eleatic Parmenides about the higher, or mental, order of 
reality 2 . 

In the chance meeting of Cephalus with Adeimantus and 
Glaucon, the brothers of Antiphon, the need is symbolised 
for the gifts of good fortune not only in external things but 
also in the soul's pursuit of the things that belong to itself 3 . 
Proclus is conscious that some of his interpretations may 
appear too subtle; but, he says, even if they w r ere not part of 
Plato's own meaning, they are profitable to us as mental 
exercise, and are an aid to the apt soul in passing from images 
to the realities that are their pattern 4 . 

1 651-653. Cf. 992. 

2 660, 26—30 : 77 /xev ovv 'Icavia ttjs (pvo-ews ecrrw <ti>iu.(3o\ov ' t) be 'IraXt'a, tt}s 
voepas ova-Las' ai be 'Adrjvcu, tt)s fiio-qs, bC 17s avobbs ecrri reus airb 7-77S 0wrea>s els 
vovv iyeipo/xivais \J/vxcus. 

3 664, 11—14: <bs ovk kv tols cktos jxovov bebfxeda tuu airb rrjs dyaOrjs t6xV* 
bupiov, dXXa Kai iv rats avrrjs tt?s ^vxv* avayuyoh ivepyeiais. Cf. in Tim. i. 197- 
198. Commenting on the words ayadrj tvxv XP?) ^yew (Tim. 26 e), Proclus 
observes that Plato refuses to say, as the Stoics did, that the good man has 
no need of fortune. 

4 675-676 : UNrre el fir) kclI ra.vd'' ovrus atiy/ceiTac 7rpos ai/rov rod UX&tojpos, dXX' 
Tjfxiv ye to irpayfia. XvaireXe's ' yvfivafffia yap ecrri rijs eixpvovs \pvxys nal airb twv 
eiKoviov inl tol Trapadeiy/naTa fxerafiaiveiv bwa/xev-qs /cat rets dpaXoyias rets iravra- 
Xov biaTeivoicras Karavoelv (fyLkotio-qs, 



250 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 

The presence of Aristoteles, afterwards one of the Thirty, 
in the company, starts a disquisition on a possible alternation 
of the same soul between the lives of the philosopher and the 
tyrant 1 . Proclus again develops the thought, which from very 
slight hints in Plato he has made effectively his own, that 
souls more loftily-minded, and therefore figured as having 
lived with the gods in heaven and seen the movements of the 
whole under supreme unity, are apt to aspire to power and 
despotic authority. He does not fail, however, to add that 
the tyrannic life, as it actually comes to be, is a sinking to the 
life of the earth-born giants, symbolising the dominance of 
passionate violence in the soul 2 . 

A characteristic position of Proclus himself, that the 
highest reality manifests itself furthest down in the scale, the 
next highest a stage short of this, and so forth 3 , is here applied 
to the personages. Aristoteles, the youngest and least in the 
philosophic life, can receive instruction only from Parmenides, 
the eldest and greatest. For minds of the first order make an 
appeal reaching to all ranks of intelligence, while minds of 
the second order can influence only intelligences less removed 
from themselves 4 . 

Parmenides, Zeno and Socrates in this dialogue correspond 
to the fiovrj, the irpooho<i and the eTruJTpofyrf'. The dialectic 
of Zeno, by which the thought of Parmenides is made more 
explicit, is of the second order, proceeding by synthesis 
through division and antithesis. That of Parmenides goes 
directly to the unity which is its object 6 . This is prior to 
multiplicity and fundamental; yet a real multiplicity, as dis- 
tinguished from spatial separation which is only phenomenal, 
is not to be denied. In some sense plurality as well as unity 

1 690-691. 

2 692, 24-28 : eVei Kal avrb to roi/s rpiaKovra Tvpawovs Kparr\(jai tQv ' Adrivuv 
<cix<pa.aiv ^x.ei ttjs Ttyavreiov Kal y-qyepovs faijs Kparo^arjs tup ' Adrjval'Kuv Kal 
'QXvfjLTrlw dyadQv' 6 yap 6ptws TiyapriKos woke/ios 4v rals ipvx<^s 4<tti.. 

3 See above, pp. 168-9. 

4 691-692. 5 712-713. Cf. pp. 166-7, above. 

6 701-702. Cf . in Alcib. I. 519, 2-6 : fiera 5e tt\v iirKTrrjixriv ko.1 ttjv iv avrrj 
yv/JLva<riav t&s /xh (rwdeaeis Kal ras diaiptaeis Kal t&s iro\vei8eX$ /uera/Sdo-eis diro- 
Qertov, tirl oe ttjv voepav faijv Kal rets &7rAas iTTtfioXas fieraaTareov ttjv \}/vxw. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 251 

exists causally; that is, in the primal metaphysical reality 1 . 
What Parmenides affirmed was that Being in itself is One; 
what Zeno denied was that a plurality absolutely dispersed 
and without any unity that it participates in can be real at 
all. This granted, he did not deny the Many. And indeed, 
Proclus adds, there is multitude not only with the unity that 
is Being, but with the unity beyond 2 . 

One name applied by the Neo-Platonists to unity in a 
generalised sense needs elucidation in view of the historical 
change in its significance. It would be misleading, in the 
absence of explanation, to translate the term /jlovcis by 
"monad." A monad in its modern sense, as fixed by Leibniz, 
signifies a minimum of real or mental being containing im- 
plicitly or potentially the order of the universe. In Neo- 
Platonism this idea is not absent, but it is expressed by the 
term "microcosm." The monad or unit is not the atomic 
individual, but the unity of a group. The units become more 
inclusive till at length the "Monas monadum 3 ," the Demi- 
urgus or mind of the universe, is reached. It is possible, how- 
ever, that in this commentary we come upon the idea that 
led to the change of sense. In one place Proclus speaks of 
"the monads in individuals" (ra? iv rot? arofiois fjuovdha^Y. 
This means that the specific or generic unity of the individuals 
is not only over them but exists in each 5 . The transition, we 
see, was obvious ; but the difference remains that by Proclus the 
individual as such, or the minimum, is never called a monad 6 . 

1 712, 2-3 : 7] 5£ atria tou irX'qOovs icri irias /cat avrrj /car' alriav to TrXijdos. 
Cf . 620, 5—8 : Set jxev yap Kal h> elvai to ov Kal iroWd ' Kal yap iracra fiovds £x et Tt 
gvgtolxov eavrr} irXrjdos, Kal irav 7t\t}6os virb fxovddos twos irepiix €TaL T V* o.vt<$ 
Trpoo~r}KOvo"r)S. 

2 Cf . 764, 28-30 : TrXrjdos Kai £u ov fxbvov ovanSdis £o~tiv, d\\a /cat vrckp ovalav. 

3 733, 35-36 : fxovas yovv zgtiv 6 drj/miovpybs fioudduv ToWuiv TrepiXrjirTiKr} dduv. 
This phrase was taken up by Bruno, in whom perhaps the transition first 
appears to the later sense of "monad." 

4 735, 10-11. 

5 Cf. in Tim. ii. 222, 5-13. The monad in relation to which the other parts 
of the soul are ordered is not to be considered as the minimum of quantity 
and the basis of numeration, but as the first principle of the soul's essence 
and the root of its powers. 

6 Cf. in Tim. iii. 221, 25-26: i) ttjs eTep6T7)To$ Mva/xis /cara/ce/O/ttar^et t6 6\ov 
ets rd p-^prj /cat rds [xovddas els tovs dpiBfiotis. 



252 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 

For the rest, differences of terminology allowed for, it must 
be clear from the general exposition that Neo-Platonism con- 
tains an analogue of Leibnizian monadism. The essential con- 
trast is that the Neo-Platonic real individual is primarily an 
idea, not, as with Leibniz, a force; and that it is not purely 
self-evolving, but interacts with other metaphysical beings. 
For Proclus, as for Plotinus, there are " Ideas of individuals " ; 
and, if he does not carry real individuality below the rational 
soul, this does not mean that the permanent soul consists only 
of the reason; within its unity are included certain "roots," 
as we may call them, of the irrational life that is part of the 
life in time 1 . But prior to individuals and their energies are 
certain intellectually defined modes of existence, such as 
"likeness" and "unlikeness," to which all active manifesta- 
tion is secondary. In the unity of Mind that contains the 
Ideas, all opposites pre-exist with creative power. There they 
are at peace, like the antenatal Caesar and Pompey in Virgil. 
Violence and mutual destruction arise only when they become 
embodied in matter 2 . 

Illae autem paribus quas fulgere cernis in armis, 
Concordes animae nunc et dum nocte premuntur, 
Heu quantum inter se bellum si lumina vitae 
Attigerint, quantas acies stragemque ciebunt ! 3 

Each soul is one by participating in the unity of the whole 
(ultimately in virtue of the transcendent unity beyond the 
whole) ; but it is one as being itself, not as identical absolutely 
with that unity and therefore in essence one with every other 
soul. Alcibiades and Socrates and other apparent persons are 
not really the same soul disguised by differences of per- 
ceptible appearance. These differences have indeed an inferior 
degree of reality in contrast with the unity of the person ; but 
the differing individuality is not a mere illusion arising from 
them. This is stated definitely against a doctrine of the 
"identity of opposites" already formulated. Must we, asks 
Proclus, say that likeness is unlikeness and unlikeness like- 
ness, and sameness otherness and otherness sameness, and 

1 More is said on this theory later. See pp. 289-90. 

2 739-742. 3 Aen% yi # 826-829. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 253 

multitude one and the One itself multitude; from which it 
would follow that each is all the rest, and that there is nothing 
that is not all, and that thus the part is no less than the 
whole 1 ? This, he shows, would lead to a quest for smaller and 
smaller parts, each identical with the whole, and so to an 
infinite dispersion incompatible with the limitation that is 
essential to knowledge. Again, if there is in reality nothing 
but the Self-same, and all else is unreal distinction resting on 
names, the identity, being itself a term of the distinction, 
exists only as bare notion; and so, the cause of the appear- 
ances being gone as reality, nothing remains 2 . Yet, he allows, 
the identification of opposites is a way of indicating the unity 
in which all distinctions are implicit 3 . In the unity of Mind, 
each exists as itself, but not as "itself alone 4 ." 

Perhaps we find in the course of this disquisition a nearer 
anticipation than is to be met with elsewhere of the Hegelian 
dialectic, though the terms are differently ordered. The pro- 
gress of a good mind, says Proclus, has three stages, illustrated 
in the Socrates of the Dialogue. First there is the starting 
away from and denial of something strange; then the sus- 
picion that it may be true; lastly the recognition that it is 
true in one sense while the denial is true in another 5 . Hegel's 
ordering of the stages — that the first is to assert an accepted 
position, the second to find contradictions in it, and the third 
to reaffirm it with modifications — seems to indicate a more 
conservative temperament than that of his Greek precursor. 

Before discussing in detail the criticism of the Ideas that is 
ascribed to Parmenides, Proclus sets himself to prove by an 
argument of his own that they must exist. The argument is 
essentially that a metaphysical reality is necessary to explain 
the physical universe, which is not explicable from itself. 
This reality cannot proceed by deliberation and choice; for 
these are secondary causes within the whole: but, on the 
other hand, it must not be a mere good to which things aspire 
(as with Aristotle), but which produces nothing 6 . Thought 

1 751, 15-25. 2 751-753. 3 760. 4 755. 5 757-758. 

* 788, 27-28: ov /xbvov &rrcu t€\ikov e/cetvo rod iravrbs oXtiov, dXXa /cat 
iroirjTLKOV. 



254 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 

indeed is prior, and does not exist for the sake of production ; 
yet production follows as its effect 1 . The order of the uni- 
verse is to be conceived as determined necessarily by more 
generalised intellectual existences acting downwards through 
mediate stages to bring into being the more special. That 
this is the necessity of the case is argued from the power of the 
human mind to geometrise, for example, with more accuracy 
than is to be met with in external nature even in astronomical 
phenomena, to reason with probative consequence from 
generals to particulars, and so forth. As this in us is inex- 
plicable from the particulars of experience, but' makes them 
intelligible, so also, in the whole, a higher intellectual order of 
causes is needed to explain that which is manifested physic- 
ally. And so we arrive at the fundamental thought of the 
Platonic doctrine of Ideas ; that generals have more being and 
more causal efficacy than particulars 2 . 

Side by side with this, however, we must not fail to notice 
the constant repetition by Proclus of the position that in 
experience the imperfect always genetically precedes the per- 
fect. This is no casual thought, but deliberate antithesis. It 
would be correct to say that for him the process of nature is 
upward, not downward. If he treats the causal order — the 
order of realities — as the reverse, that is because he is looking 
for an adequate explanation of the final perfection of each 
thing: the cause of this, he holds, must be in its real existence 
superior, not inferior, to that which it produces. The succes- 
sion of stages in time, therefore, is antithetic to the order of 
implication in the whole. 

At first sight contradictory to what has been said about 
the doctrine of individuality held by Proclus, is a passage 
expressly opposing the theory of Plotinus that there are Ideas 
of particular individuals (t&v tcad* eKaara) 3 . What Proclus 
opposes, however, is an accident and not the essence of the 
theory 4 . The position of Plotinus that he rejects is one that 

1 791, 21 : Tip vo&v eavTOv iroi7]T7]s &ttcu tt&vtuv. 

2 796-797: ra Kad6\ov...ical ovanbrepa kol airnhrepa tuu tcad' e/caara. 

3 824. Cf. Enn. v. 7. 

4 I find that in my own exposition (pp. 61-2 above) I had stated only the 
portion of the theory that is common to both philosophers. Later study of 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 255 

seems to make the merely empirical individual, even of all 
animal races, in some sense eternal 1 . Against thus carrying 
down the idea of the individual, he raises the objection that 
on this supposition the empirical individuality of Socrates 
would be immortal. But this is a product, to speak generally, 
of the cosmic order, and, when we descend to detail, of 
seasonal and climatic influences and all sorts of special 
causes 2 . He is quite clear that the composite individual, 
Socrates or Plato, thus brought to be, has only one mortal 
life, and at the end of it disappears. This, however, is to be 
distinguished from the soul of which it is a temporary embodi- 
ment. In his view as in that of Plotinus, each individual 
human soul is permanent and goes on from life to life as the 
manifestation of a permanent "mind," which is an eternally 
distinct thing within universal Intellect 3 . According to 
Proclus. indeed, each mind is not realised in one soul only, 
but in several. These have intermittent lives in time, while 
the "mind," or intellectual type, under which they are 
grouped, is eternally active 4 . For animal souls, below some 
never exactly defined stage, the permanence (as has been said 
before) appears to be conceived as belonging to the species 
rather than to the individual 5 . 

In these complexities, it may be well to mention, Proclus 
confesses that he is not very sure of his ground. To carry our 
thinking down to the ultimate individual, he says, is beyond 

the objection taken by Proclus was necessary to bring out more exactly the 
implications in the argument of Plotinus. 

1 In like manner Spinoza appears to say that there is in infinite intellect a 
necessary and eternal concept of every human body that was and is and is to 
be (Eth. v. Prop. 22). The phrases of Plotinus that suggest a similar infinity 
of concepts are these : rrjv 8e iv t<£ vorjTcp aireiplav oi 8ei dedievai ' traaa yap kv 
afxepel (Enn. v. 7, 1); a/)' odv /cat eirl t<2v cLXKojv tyuv, ecp' Cov x\r]6os €K //tas ye- 
veaecos, to<toijtovs tovs \6yovs; t} ov <po(3r]Teoi> to eu ro?j airip[j.a<n /cat rots \6yois 
airetpov, i/'uxt)? ra iravTa ix *"* 7 )* ( v - 7, 3). 

2 825. 

3 Cf. in Tim. iii. 72, 20: aXAos fxh 6 <pcuv6/j.evos ^wKpdrrjs, aXXos 5e 6 akrjdLvds. 
* Cf. in Tim. ii. 143-145. 

5 Cf . in Tim. i. 53, 20—23 : a£ yap KareXdovaac xf/vxal irdXiu aviaaiv, ovx Serai 
T7)v vir6<TTa<riv e£ apxv* &X 0V & T V yev£o~ei Kal irepl tt)v vKrjv, oTai dr/ elaiv at iroWal 
tQ>v a\6yuv. This particular passage denies true individuality of most, but 
not of all, irrational animals. 



256 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLTJS 

the powers of the human mind, which is more adapted to 
theorise on the universal or general 1 . About the particular, 
he is sure only that, in its smallest details, it is not uncaused 2 . 

This is quite consistent with its not having its causation 
wholly in the Ideas. For causality, in his view, begins above 
intellect, from the One and Good, and does not end till un- 
formed Matter is reached. The Ideas thus constitute only a 
portion of the causal series. Evils, for example, arise through 
complexes of causation among the interacting parts of the 
whole; but there are no " Ideas of evils 3 ." There is, neverthe- 
less, an eternal idea, a irapdSeiyfia, of the knowledge of evil 
in relation to good; for this knowledge is a good and ignorance 
an evil*. 

As is well known, the most destructive criticism to which 
the doctrine of Ideas was ever subjected is put by Plato him- 
self in the mouth of Parmenides discoursing with the youthful 
Socrates. Coming to this part of the Dialogue, Proclus, first 
quite generally and then in detail, tries to determine precisely 
what is the effect of the criticism. Of course he does not fail 
to observe that in the discussion Parmenides recognises the 
necessity of some theory concerning the realities correspond- 
ing to general names if there is to be knowledge 5 . His own 
view is that all the criticism is directed towards showing the 
inadequacy of comparisons with things in space to describe 
relations between incorporeals. The relation of particulars to 
the reality signified by a general name is not physical, but of 
another kind. Image in a mirror, impression of a seal on wax, 
imitation of an object by plastic or pictorial art, may put a 
beginner in the way of thinking on the subject; but partici- 
pation in the Ideas is not of corporeal things in their like; 
for it is neither participation in the whole nor in a part as the 
terms are understood of bodies 6 . The puzzle arises from 

1 813, 17—21 : iirl yap ras dro/xovs Kai ras tdias tt&vtup diacpopas x^P^ LV Kpeirrdv 
icrriv rj /caret avdp&ireiov povp, to 5e t&pttj rj iirl ifKelcrTov 5iaTe<.v6i>T<i)P jiaWop 
i]/juu deuprjacu dvvarov. 

2 835, 11: Traprl yap adtivarov x u P LS clItIov yepeo~ip ?x e " ,< 3 829—831. 

4 833, 8-12: icalyap tj aypoia Kanop, . . . ware woXlp to Trapabeiy/ia ov Kaicov, dXX 
dyadov, tt}s tov /ca/coD ypuaeus. 

6 838, 9-11. c g 5 g # 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 257 

bringing in an antithesis that has no proper application. The 
youthful Socrates was imperfectly prepared. He had indeed 
already the notion of a general idea as a unity, but, through 
want of sufficient introspective analysis of the notion, he 
imagined the unity as somehow distributed among things set 
apart 1 . The criticism ascribed to Parmenides is thus, accord- 
ing to Proems, intended by Plato to make clear to his own 
disciples that, in his theory of Ideas, he meant them to apply 
their minds to a kind of reality which is not that of the things 
that furnish him with metaphors. In virtue of his clear insight 
beyond these, he could himself use them with the utmost free- 
dom and variety. His mode of turning on them reveals his 
full possession of that insight. 

That the Ideas are realised as notions in the soul 2 Proems 
recognises in accordance with the traditional Platonic doc- 
trine 3 ; but Parmenides, he points out, corrects the suggestion 
of Socrates that they may be only in the soul. They imply 
intelligible objects of thought; and the object is more dis- 
tinctively the Idea than is our thought of it. The notions by 
which the Ideas are realised in the soul do not come as 
generalisations from perception, which are "notions" in an- 
other sense, but make generalisation possible 4 . They are pro- 
ducts of Intellect contemplating its own being, and are more 
properly said to be "in the mind" than "in the soul" 5 ; but it 
is enough for us if our souls participate in their universality 6 . 

Proclus thus saw quite clearly that Plato's theory of ideas, 
while it had psychological references, could not be understood 
as merely psychological. His own development has strikingly 

1 864, 23-36. Cf. 865, 1—2: are rr\v vbrjcriv tt)v tvdov ix-qiru 5LapdpQaai dvvd- 
ixevos. 

2 892, 8: iu vorjfiaai tkxlv oixsiQadai rds I84as. 

3 892, 24-25: tt\v i/'uxV navTa etvai ra ddr) <pa,uev, /ecu tottov twv el8u>v ttjv 

4 893, 17-19: oirre yap [to yiyvQ<jKov~\ irap'' avrwv rdv alcrdrjTuv \ap,fiavei to 
KOivbv. Cf. 894, 24: waaa ci7r65ei£is 4k tQiv irpoTtpwv. Again, 896, 31-33 : gvdodev 
apa /cat dirb tt^s ovcrias 7]/uluu al irpofioKal ylyvovTai t<2v dbQv, xai ouk dirb tCov 
aladrjTwv. Cf. in Alcib. I. 545, 7: on TrpofidWovaiv d0' eavTwv al \pvxo.l tovs 
Xbyovs. 

5 930, 24-25. 

6 931, 17-18: ri/xeh 5e dyairtofiev <xi> t<2v voepuv \}/vx<-kus fxeT^xwres ddwv. 

w. 17 



258 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 

Kantian turns; and it may be said in his favour that, by his 
distinction between "soul" and "mind" (the associate of a 
particular body and the intellect in which it shares), he makes 
clearer than Kant did that it is not the merely individual in- 
telligence that is conceived as "projecting" the forms of 
knowledge. Another glimpse confirms the general impression 
made. The term ego did not become a technical term with 
the Neo-Platonists ; but Proclus uses it in one place in a sense 
very like Kant's "transcendental unity of apperception." In 
serving to indicate every mental act, perceptive, volitional, 
intellectual, it points, he says, to "some one life" that moves 
the soul to assert each psychical state in turn, to some one 
indivisible thing in us that knows all our energies, e<£' eicao-Ta) 
\eyov to iyo) nal to ivepya, 1 . This he applies as an analogy to 
show how there can be an indivisible divine knowledge, know- 
ing things not as they appear but in their causes or essences, 
and at the same time creative by its activity which is one 
with its thought. 

Theory of knowledge thus passes into ontology. In his 
theory of reality, Proclus carefully distinguishes that which 
he regards as the all-inclusive doctrine of Plato 2 from Aris- 
totelianism on the one side and Stoicism on the other. Each 
of these has an element of truth. The things in the universe 
co-operate in its processes by their aspiration to Mind; but 
the Mind that is the end does not stand apart in complete 
isolation from the things that aspire 3 . Its thinking is also 
creative 4 . This the Stoics recognised when they conceived a 
providential order as running through matter; but they did 
not recognise that transcendence of the divine intellect which, 
by the too exclusive emphasis on it, makes the pure mono- 
theism of Aristotle "dark with excessive bright 5 ." The refu- 
tation of this exclusiveness is put in the form of the questions : 
How can the physical universe strive after the divine if it 
has not its origin thence 6 ? How can we know the object of 

1 957-958. 2 921, 10-13. 

3 842, 26-28: rots fiev ovv tov vovv Tekitcbv alriov iroiov<xiv, d\V oxrxi xai drj/uu- 
ovpyitcbv, e£ i]/xL<T€ias virapxei- to akrjde's. 

4 844, 1—2: ws voel, iroiet, teal ws Troiei, voel. /ecu del endrepov. 5 See e.g., 955. 
6 922, 3—4 : 7rws yap 6 ovpavbs opeyerai rod delov, fir] yeuofxevos etceWev; 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 259 

aspiration if we neither have our existence from it nor par- 
ticipate in the laws that express its true reality 1 ? The Ideas, 
for Proclus, thus represent the intellectual diversity by which 
the unity of the universe is mediated to its parts ; for it is the 
Ideas that are meant by these " intelligential laws 2 ." 

The philosophic impulse, says Proclus, is called by Par- 
menides "divine" as looking beyond visible things to incor- 
poreal being, and "beautiful" as leading to the truly beauti- 
ful, which is not in things practical, as the Stoics later deemed, 
but in the intellectual energies. This impulse to beauty the 
philosophic life has in common with the life of the true lover 3 . 
To urge Socrates to pay special attention to the apparently 
useless dialectic called by the vulgar "idle talk" (aSo\e<ry/a), 
is a way of indicating that this is the true salvation of souls, 
and is one with the power of theorising on being and judging 
of truth 4 . This is how it is put "enthusiastically 5 "; but 
Proclus can also soberly point out the danger of approaching 
ontological questions without a sufficient training in theory 
of knowledge 6 . The aim is to discover one method for solving 
many problems, not to be able plausibly to attack or defend 
every rival solution 7 . This showy sort of accomplishment in 
the forms of logic the multitude admires 8 . The preliminary 
gymnastic advised by Parmenides is troublesome, and force 
must be used to drag oneself away from a direct attack on 
those problems of being that excite impassioned interest. The 
season for it is youth, when there is vigour for toil, and plenty 
of time, and when discipline can be applied so that the pro- 
cedure shall be by orderly stages. 

Proclus himself gives one or two illustrations of the kind 
of search commended. Starting from the Sophist, he sets 
forth a theory of relative not-being. Of this there are various 
kinds. Matter, as we know, is a kind of not- being because it 

1 923, 2-4: 7ru;s 8e /cat i)ixeh eKelvo yLyvdxXKOixev, fxrjTe vwocrravTes iiceWev, firjTe 
\byuv /j-er^xovres t<2v ovtus 'ovtuv; 

2 Cf . 888, 2 : voepovs \6yovs elvai rets ideas. 3 988. 

4 990, 7-11 : 7rapa p.ev rots ttoWocs dSoAecrxtaz' Trpo<TayopevofAei>r]v, KvpiuTara 5e 
ovcrav a\r)0ivi]v crwTtjpiav ti2v xf/vxw, e£ &v (pavepbv otl tclvt6v eari rrj dewprjTiKfj 
rdv &vtwv /cat Kpirinrj ttjs dXrjdeias bvvdfxeu Cf. 1024, 33-38. 

5 Cf. 987, 18-21. 6 989-991. 7 984-985. 8 990, 13-14. 

17—2 



260 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 

is in itself unformed. Material things phenomenally are, but 
in the proper sense of being are not 1 . On the other hand, the 
cause of all is a kind of not-being because it is set over against 
the forms of being 2 . There is no absolute not-being 3 . This 
was the truth affirmed by Parmenides in the poem. 

Next Proclus tries to apply the method of the Dialogue to 
the soul. What will be the result to itself and to other things 
if we say, in one sense or another, that it is or that it is not? 
Here the most interesting remark occurs at the close : that it 
would be easier to begin from bodies than from the soul, since 
we are better acquainted with bodies and the consequences of 
their animation or non-animation than with what happens to 
the soul itself 4 . 

While commending slow, methodical approaches to philo- 
sophical questions, Proclus finds it to be a merit in the Par- 
menides that the relation of dialectic to the things themselves 
about which truth is desired is never left out of view in a 
round of mere unapplied logical generalities 5 . So difficult was 
the combination found to be that none of Plato's successors 
composed any treatise in this form 6 . Again, while approving 
of toil over dry distinctions as good for philosophic youth, he 
singles out expressly for notice the proposal of Parmenides 
that the youngest in the company shall answer his questions, 
because he will be the most docile and will give the least 
trouble; grounding on this the observation that "to energise 
with ease is divine 7 ." This is a Hellenic point of view. The 
power, bearing with it the appearance of struggle and volition, 
which the ancients sometimes called "daemonic" and which 
we call " Titanic 8 ," seemed to the Greek spirit, now retired 

1 999, 26—27 : to evvKov irav, are (paivo^evus /xev 6v, Kvpitas 5e ovk ov. 

2 999, 36-39. 3 999-1000: to p.ev /j.T)5apLT] p-yda/mus ov ovheiroTe inrodeTeov. 

4 1006, 29-35: Kal bpas us iv tclijtcus tcus virodtaeo-i yevoiT' av paov 6 \6yos 
ovk air'' avTrjs rjfiwv ap%ap.£vwv ttjs -J/vxvs* a\\' airo tCov cup-aruv' TavTa yap 
yvcoptpLLOTepa ttjs ipvxos, xal tQv eirop.evwv iiceLvr) koI oi>x eiropuevuv to. to&tols 
ewofxeva kclI ovx eirop-eva, Tip /zerexe'*' V p.r) fieTix eLV faXV** 

5 1018, 25-27: to dta t<2v irpa.ypi.aTwv avruv odevetv avTrjv Kal p.7) ev \pi\ot$ 
vcpeaT&vai. Toh \oyiKoh Kavocn. 

6 1020, 31-35. 

7 1037, 37-38 : delov £o~tl tovto to p.eTa pg.o'Twvrjs ivepyeiv. 

8 Through the Orphic myth of the tearing in pieces of Dionysus by the 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 261 

into its watch-tower, to be of the second order. The highest 
life attainable by man is the life of intellectual contemplation 
beyond effort 1 . 

It is only after this wide expatiation on the preliminary 
matter that we arrive at direct discussion of the hypotheses 
concerning the One. Of these nine were enumerated. All the 
rest of the Commentary that survives is devoted to the first. 
This was indeed the most important for Neo-Platonism ; com- 
prising as it did the proof that no predicates are applicable to 
the One. All the hypotheses, with their various affirmations 
and negations, Proclus says, are true of it though in different 
senses, just as all the paradoxes on the Ideas are in some sense 
true 2 . For him, however, as for his school, the highest truth 
is in what has since been called the "negative theology." 
Not only is the One unknowable to us, but we do not even 
know that it is knowable to itself 3 . Thus it is properly name- 
less. Yet it undoubtedly is 4 . The meaning of the negations is 
that, since it is the cause of all, it is not distinctively any of the 
things that it produces. On the other hand, all the affirma- 
tions of real existences that are not the One have for their 
causes the negations applied to it 5 ; for it is above all deter- 
minate being, as matter, or bare possibility, is below all deter- 
minate being. Its positive reality is apprehended by the unity 

Titans, the " Titanic " had come to be interpreted as symbolising the principle 
of diremption in the world-process. See in Cratyl. 64, 17-20; cf. 77-78. 

1 1025, 32-34: y.bvr\ be rj /caret vovv fan? to airkaves £x et > K0 ^ ovtos 6 fivaTiKOS 
opfxos ttjs ipvxvs- 

2 972, 9-11. ' • 

3 1108, 25-29 : /cat oi>x y/uv ^v ayvoxxTov, eavry be yvioarov eariv ' el yap ecriv 
6'Xws rj/uuv ayvojerrov, ovbe avrb tovto yiyvdicrKOfxeu oti eavru) yvuoTov effTiv, aXKa 
/cat tovto ayvoodjiev. 

4 1065, 31-33: avayicq brjirov w&vtus eTvai tovto to '4v, ov irdvTa d7ro0d<r/cerat. 

5 1075, 16-19: dXX' et fie XPV o-WTdficos elirelv to boKovv ,. uiairep to £v olLtlov 
io~Ti tQv 6\cou, of/rw /cat a7ro0dcrets at'rt'at tQiv KCLTa<p'ao~euv efoiv. We are re- 
minded of Spinoza's saying that determination is negation: see Ep. 50 (ed. 
Bruder), where also he says that to speak of God even as one is to apply a 
term that is not properly applicable. The sentence in which this is put would 
have been accepted by a Neo-Platonist as correct if we are to speak with the 
utmost rigour. " Quoniam vero Dei existentia ipsius sit essentia, deque eius 
essentia universalem non possimus formare ideam, certum est, eum, qui 
Deum unum vel unicum nuncupat, nullam de Deo veram habere ideam, vel 
improprie de eo loqui." 



262 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 

of existence at the summit of our intellect, a kind of bloom 
of the mind, avdos rod vov 1 . It is itself completely trans- 
cendent, " imparticipable " (afxeOeKrov, ^coptarov, airo ttclvtwv 
etryprj/jLevov). It is God simply and absolutely. The con- 
ception of gods as makers or fathers is the partial conception 
of a kind of divinity, not of divinity simply 2 . Divinity is 
properly unity 3 . Are we to call it Limit or Unlimited? Un- 
limited, Proclus finally answers; for it is not subject to the 
limits which we say in relation to other things that it fixes 
for them 4 . 

This, Proclus recognises, goes beyond anything in the poem 
cf Parmenides 5 , which demonstrates only the unity of that 
which is (to ev 6v), not the unity beyond being. At the same 
time, he holds that there was a theology behind the doctrine 
of Parmenides himself, though he did not give it the explicit 
form that it has in Plato. Some commentators, it appears, 
doubted whether the developments in the Parmenides were 
really Platonic ; but Proclus establishes their Platonic charac- 
ter from the Sophist, with its connected line of argument 6 . 

1 Cf. in Cratyl. 66, 11-12. 

2 1097, 1-3 : eldds ti deoryros fiepiKov, 5 drj itolov eari delov, dX\' ov-xl air\us. 
Cf. 1096, 30: 6 yap dr]p.iovpyds nal 6 irar-qp tis debs. 

3 1069, 8-9. 

4 See the interesting dissertation on the kinds of infinity and the kinds of 
limit, pp. 1117-1124. There is infinity in matter as itself formless; in body 
without quality, as divisible without limit; in the qualities of bodies, admit- 
ting of continuous differences in intensity (to fiaWov re kcu t\ttov, Phileb. 
24 b); in the perpetual renewal of birth; in the rotatory movement of the 
heaven; in the soul with its continuous transitions from thought to thought; 
in time, limitless as to the numbers with which it measures the motions of the 
soul; in intellect, ever present in the intelligential fife with no limit to its 
duration; and in eternity (6 ito\vv/j.v7)tos aldbv), which is prior to intellect and 
is the potency of all infinities. In the reverse direction, the notion of limit can 
be applied at all stages short of formless matter; for all in one aspect involve 
measure and number. Eternity is the measure of mind, time of the soul; the 
movement of the heaven takes place by the repetition of a measurable period; 
the Ideas manifested in the succession of births are finite in number; body is 
finite in extension. 

5 The Parmenides of the poem is always distinguished from the Parmenides 
of Plato. The phrase is: 6 iv rots irorjixaai HapixeviSrjS (1177, 3), 6 iv rots eireat 
UapfieviSrjs (1177, 12). Cf. 1240, 32-37. 

6 1103, 6-8: wVre rj iKeivois airiGrdrw tls ws ov HX&twpos de&fiaaiv, 7J /cat 
tovtois criry^wpetrw. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 263 

Proclus no doubt read into his predecessors, including Plato, 
some distinctions not developed till later; but he was quite 
aware that he might be "reading between the lines"; and, as 
the philologists who have recently discussed or edited the 
texts fully recognise, "historical sense" cannot be denied to 
him or to the Neo-Platonic school. If he is unwilling to admit 
as some did, that Plato corrected Parmenides, he does not 
hesitate to allow that he added a new point of view 1 . The 
demonstration of Parmenides, he observes, is not directly of 
the One, but of Being, and he proceeds by affirmation of 
that which is. Plato, in the first hypothesis, proceeds by 
denying all attributes to the One itself; only afterwards, in 
the second hypothesis, where he combines Being with the 
One, does he assert the unity of Being. The higher point of 
view is attained by denying, through a methodical process, 
everything that can possibly be asserted of the One. It is 
beyond expression even by the "rest " or " quiet " or " silence " 
of the mystics 2 . Yet, though it is in a sense "not-being," it 
may be better spoken of as a kind of being to avoid confusing 
it with the not-being that is below ail positive existence 3 . 
Different modes of speech are allowable from different points 
of view. Thus Proclus allows himself to use the language of 
personal theism characteristic of the Laws, while treating it 
definitely as exoteric. Assertions such as that God is begin- 
ning, middle and end are, he says, only relative to other 
things, and are not properly applicable to the incomprehen- 
sible existence of the One itself 4 . 

What then, it may be asked, is there of positive insight in 
the final result? There is, it seems to me, the clear notion 
that we apprehend ultimate reality by the "synthetic unity" 

1 1135, 2—5: ovk eXeyxos eari ravra rijs HapfxevL8ov <pi\ocro(pLas, d\X eKelvrjs 
fxevo^/crrjs irpovdeais rrjs vweprepas. 

2 1171, 4—8: e'tre ovv ya\r]i>7} ris iariv v/j.v7]/j.iv7j voepa irapa roh ao<poh, elre 
op/nos /jlv(Ttik6s, e'tre atyrj irarpiKri, 8rj\ov us airavTUP t<2v tolovtoov e^prjrai to 'ev, 
eTT€K€Lva St> Kal evepyeias kclI aiyrjs /cat rjavxi-OLS. 

3 1079-1082. 

4 1113-1116. The One is not even "in itself," for all place must be denied 
of it: fidvov 5e rb £v airXws ovSa/xov ecmv (1135, 40). This means that it alone 
has no cause in which it can be said to be. 



264 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 

in our own minds. This, of course, could not be said by Par- 
menides; and Plato himself could not yet say it in the sub- 
jective terms that would have appropriately conveyed his 
thought. Even Plotinus has to help out theoretical insight 
by mystical experience. The last degree of self-conscious 
clearness was reached only by Proclus at the end of the long 
development. If the One is now more firmly than ever de- 
clared to be objectively unknown and unknowable, it is at 
the same time definitely made the correlate of what is sub- 
jectively the principle of cognition 1 . The distinction between 
the One and the Mind of the Whole, as Berkeley with his 
kindred subtlety perceived, had become the metaphysical 
analogue of the psychological distinction between self and 
intellect 2 ; the ultimate self in each and in the whole being a 
kind of unknowable point of origin of all determinate forms 
of thought or reality. It is the nature of human language, 
applied primarily to things outside, that compels philosophers 
to speak of that which is most real as a negation of all that is 
customarily described as "being." 

ON THE TIMAEUS* 

To justify the order in which I am taking the Commentaries, 
the words of Proclus himself can now be cited. The Timaeus 
being a physical treatise, he observes, it proceeds downwards 
from intelligible reality, and in the logical order follows the 
Parmenides*. He quotes Iamblichus with approval to the 
effect that these two dialogues contain the whole theoretical 
philosophy of Plato 5 . Through the absence or loss of the 
portion of the preceding commentary treating of the other 
meanings assigned to the One, there must of course be a gap 
in the exposition. For it was not immediately from the One 
without predicates, the unknowable source, that Proclus 
made the transition to the theory of nature, but from the 
unity of Being and Mind. 

1 1044, 26-28: XetVerai drj to ev, rod vov tovtov /cat tt\v virap^iv /cat to olov 
avdos, tovto elvai tt\v irp&T7]v dpxw- Cf . 1047, 1 : ttjv fiiav dpxv v T y* yv&veus. 

2 Siris, § 352. 3 17 a-44 d. 4 i. 12-14. 

5 i. 13, 14-17: bpdQs apa (prjalv 6 deios 'Idfx.(3\ixos tt)v 6\r)v tov HXaTuvos dew- 
piav ev -rots 8vo roi^rots 7reptex«r0at §ta\o7ots, Tt/iot'y /cat HappLevidrj. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 265 

In spite of the gap, the positions taken up at the opening 
can be directly connected with what has just been said about 
the subjective basis of the Neo-Platonic ontology. Since man 
is a microcosm 1 , knowledge of man and of the world are 
necessarily correlated. As God or the One can only be appre- 
hended as the cause by the principle itself of the mind, so the 
Being of which the universe is a manifestation can only be 
understood by mind in its explicit activity. To place the 
theory of thinking beside the theory of the object of thought 
is declared to be a Pythagorean point of view 2 . This meant 
what we now call an idealistic position. The remark has 
special relevance because the historical Timaeus was said to 
have been a Pythagorean 3 . 

In accordance with that which had become the general pre- 
supposition of the commentators, the minutest details in the 
setting of the Dialogue are interpreted as symbolism 4 . 

The City, as well as Man, is a microcosm 5 . Hence analogies 
can be found between the distributions of functions to the 
classes in the State (recapitulated in the opening summary of 
the Republic) and the orders of beings in the universe. A point 
of interest in detail is that Proclus, with Theodore of Asine, 
firmly upholds the position that men and women have the 
same virtue and perfection, being not two different races, but 
portions of the same race, which as such is human, not male 
or female 6 . The secret arrangement of marriages by the 
guardians under the appearance of leaving them to be deter- 
mined by casting lots he interprets as indicating the reality of 
metaphysical causation in the universe behind apparent 
chance-collocations 7 . 

When Socrates tells the company that he cannot represent 

1 i. 5, 11—13: fjuicpbs /cooytos 6 avdpcoiros /cat '4(jtl /cat ev toijt<p iravra /xept/cws, 
6'<ra ev r<p Koapt-cp tfet'ws re /cat 6\t/ca>s. Cf. i. 202, 26-27. 

2 i. 5, 22-23. 

3 Proclus supposed the work ascribed to Timaeus Locrus, Ilepi \f/vxas tcho-p-v 
/cat <t>v<rios, to be by Timaeus himself. 

4 i. 26, 8-10: tclvtcl fxkv ovv yvpLvaaia irpoTeiviodo) 7-775 tQv TrpayfjL&Twv detoplas 
iv rots Trpooifxiois avrijs eUovLKus e"p.(pcuv6p.eva. 

5 i. 33, 24—25: ov yap irov puKpbs fiev KocrpLos 6 avdpuxos, oi)%t 5e ^t/cpos 77 7r6Xts 
Koap^os. 

6 i. 46. 7 i. 51, 6-8. 



266 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 

his City bodied forth, but must limit himself to abstractions, 
Proclus finds this to be a mark of superabundant power, not 
of weakness 1 . The philosophic mind is analogous to the higher 
cause, remaining at the summit of the productive series, and 
not itself descending to particulars 2 . Like many interesting 
and subtle ideas in Proclus, this has its "occasional cause" in 
the effort to justify every detail in Plato. It resembles what 
is said by Comte in the Philosophie Positive when he treats 
science and philosophy as more originative than art, and there- 
fore prior in the directive order. It might be defended by 
incidental expressions in the poets themselves. Milton, for 
example, places the "thoughts more elevate 3 " of moral philo- 
sophy above song. In the celebrated passage in praise of 
beauty, Marlowe, where he speaks of the poets' work, might 
be taken as conceding the superiority of abstract ideas even to 

all the heavenly quintessence they still 
From their immortal flowers of poesy, 
Wherein, as in a mirror, we perceive 
The highest reaches of a human wit 4 . 

The italicised words are in fact curiously coincident with the 
Neo-Platonic doctrine for which imagination is analogous to 
a mirror placed as a mean between thought and sense. 
Proclus, however, made this high claim only for thought 
which, in its moments of enthusiasm, becomes, like Plato's, 
itself a kind of poetry. Inspired poetry (eV0eo? iroi7)(Ti<i) is for 
him at the summit. We find it, he holds, in Plato as in Homer. 
An error in the Commentary is that the Critias of the 
Dialogue is taken to be the member of the Thirty. Modern 
commentators also have generally assumed this. As Prof. 
Burnet has recently shown 5 , he is not the oligarch, but his 
grandfather and the great-grandfather of Plato. Alexander of 
Aphrodisias still had the relationships right. Once recognised, 

1 i. 62, 31 : Kal %<ttip i] ToiavTT) ddvuafiia dvuafiias irepiovala. 

2 This must not be confounded with the Aristotelian view that providence 
does not descend to particulars, but only to generals. The Neo-Platonists 
held that it descends, but through grades, more and more lowered as they are 
more removed from contemplation and more immersed in practice. 

3 Paradise Lost, ii. 558. 4 Tamburlaine the Great, Part I. Act v. Sc. 2. 
5 Greek Philosophy, Part I. (1914), § 256, p. 338. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 267 

they make the account of the tradition from Solon chrono- 
logically possible. Proclus was evidently a little puzzled about 
this; but he was more interested in the symbolism than in the 
exact chronology 1 . C'ritias, for him, like Alcibiades and Aris- 
toteles, is the naturally gifted mind aspiring to tyranny. The 
coming from heaven of such a mind signifies, as we have 
already seen, the fascination exercised on it by the power 
manifested in the hierarchical direction of the whole. Again, 
as before, Proclus observes that the ambition for power be- 
longs after all to a mind of the second order; for principality 
and sway and dominion are not the highest, but are only in 
the middle place 2 . With this it is in harmony that Timaeus, 
having a position in the dialogue corresponding to that of 
the Demiurge in the universe, symbolises the personally- 
governing Zeus subordinated to Adrasteia 3 . 

To any who think that the Neo-Platonists represent a 
swamping of Greek thought in Orientalism, I commend the 
passage in this Commentary on the interview between Solon 
and the Egyptian priest. Proclus has a very clear idea of 
progress as the principle for which Athens stands against a 
fixed order like that of Egypt. Pride in mere length of memory 
of the past, he finds, savours of conceit. "The learning of 
many things does not bring forth mind (iroXvfjLadelri voov ov 
<j)V€i), says the noble Heraclitus 4 ." Turning his philosophic 
rationalism against the prestige of an old historic order, he 
dwells on the thought that memories and sense-perceptions 
do not suffice to produce knowledge 5 . We ourselves project 

1 i. 82, 19-21. 

2 i. 71, 10-11 : to yap ^yefioviKov /cat to cttI iroWa biaTelvov /cat o\ws rj Stivafus 
tQ>v fxtviw iffrt. 

3 i. 69, 24-26. 4 i. 102, 24-25. 

5 i. 102, 29-31 : tcls p.vi]ixas /cat tcls alcrdrjcreis ttol^tlkols elvcu tt)s eirLCfT^ix-qs, us 
(prjaiv 6 'AptcrTOTe\77s, aduvaTov. From a scholium on this passage we learn 
incidentally what various possibilities could still be realised by the Greek 
intellect. The writer distinctly suggests the" radical empiricism " of a "psycho- 
logy without the soul." If there are no souls, he says, it is not only not 
impossible, it is necessary, that memories and sense-perceptions should be 
productive of knowledge: ei tls \6yos 5et'£et, <f>L\e IIpdKXe, ixt] inrdpxetv tcls 
\pvxas, ov p.6vov ovk a,§vva.T0v, aXka /cat avaynouov ras /xvrjfxas /cat alcd-qceis 
TToirjTiKas efrat tuv iinaTynuv (i. 463). 



268 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 

on the particulars the unity of the universal 1 . The priest, it 
is true, in his insistence on the claims of age, has hold of the 
principle that the elder, that is, the ontologically prior cause, 
is that which preserves the stability of the whole. Yet, great 
as is this conservative order in the cosmos, the principle of 
renewal figured by the creative action of Athena 2 goes back 
to a higher point of the all-inclusive causal series, in which 
fixity and alternating cycles alike have their source 3 . And he 
could put stress on this against what seemed too arrogant in 
the claims of the East while fully recognising the spirit of 
unification in the old order, admired by Plato as afterwards 
by Comte in its opposition to the dispersiveness of the new 4 . 

Nor is his Greek rationalism unaccompanied by a feeling 
for the importance of historic memory. To acquire knowledge 
of the past from the stable orders, where these have kept 
records, he remarks, contributes in the highest degree towards 
perfecting human wisdom 5 . In a later passage 6 , he dwells on 
the value for scientific theory of the empirical results attained 
by the long-continued observations of Egyptian and Chal- 
daean astronomers ; setting these against the mere agreement 
with hypothesis of what can at present be observed. A true 
conclusion, he points out, can be reached from false assump- 
tions; and the consonance of phenomena with hypotheses is 
an insufficient test of the truth of these. 

When the priest reconstitutes from recorded history that 
memory of past cycles which had been lost by the younger 
world, Proclus finds this procedure to be imitated by the 
Pythagoreans, who set themselves to show how individuals 
may restore the memory of their former lives. For the differ- 
ent periods of a race may be compared to the different lives 

1 i. 103, 1: to ev...eldos Trpo[3dX\o/xev. 

2 i. 103, 8—9: rr\v veav brjfXLOvpyiav ttjv virb rrjs 'AdTjvds o~vvexofJ.evr]V. 

3 i, 103, 30: to vewrepov e£ vireprepas rjicei rd^ews. 

4 i. 104, 14-17 : ctv/j.(3o\ov yap to p.ev iroXibv vorjcreus /ecu dxpdurov far)s kcll iroppio 
yeueaecos ovarjs, to 8e veov ttjs /xepiKWTepas yvuaecos kcll 7-77S i(pairTOfievr]S ijdrj twv 
yiypofxevwv. Cf. 127, 23-27. 

5 i. 124, 11—13: ai t&v irpoo-dev irepioduv icTTopiai fxeyltXTi/jv els (ppovrjaiv Trape- 
Xovtcli crvvTeXeiav. 

6 iii. 125-126. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 269 

of one man, or rather, of one soul 1 . Whatever may be the case 
with the soul's history, it seems to me that this image is truer 
to the facts of progress as hitherto known than that which 
was taken over by Comte from Pascal, viz., that the history of 
Humanity may be compared to the life of one man continually 
living and learning. The choice has been, so far as experience 
yet shows, between Egyptian or Byzantine fixity on the one 
side and movement through upheavals and submergences on 
the other. Proclus gives a rationale of the theory, stated in 
the Dialogue, of catastrophic destructions. Composite unities 
such as races and cities, he says, occupying an intermediate 
position between the imperishable whole and individual or- 
ganic things, which are easily dissoluble, are destroyed only 
at long intervals; for it is only at rare conjunctures that the 
causes destructive of their parts all co-operate ; usually, what 
is destructive of one part is preservative of another 2 . Briefly 
glancing at his own time, he suggests that the cause of the 
depopulation now said to exist in Attica, being neither fire nor 
flood, as in former depopulations, is "a certain dire impiety 
utterly blotting out the works of men 3 ." This is said merely 
in passing. Like Plato, he assumes in his general theory that 
remnants are always left. 

The wonder that Solon said he felt at the history (Tim. 
23 d) is made the occasion of observing that in us wonder is 
the beginning of knowledge of the whole 4 . 

Proclus finds that the political order of Egypt described by 
the priest is a stage below that which has been set forth by 
Socrates 5 . For the ruling priestly class is inferior to the ruling 
class of guardians in the Republic, who as philosophers go 
back by insight to primal reality. Moreover, Plato in the 
Politicus subordinated the priests to the statesman, and gave 

1 i. 124, 7—9: ws yap tcp? evbs dvSpds, fidWov 8e rpvxv* fua.s, 8ia<p6povs j3iovs, 
ourws £<f> evbs Zdvovs ras 8<.a<p6povs wepi68ovs TrpoarjKei \ap,(3dveiv. 

2 i. 116. 

3 i. 122, 11-12: Seivijs tivos dae(3eias dp8r}v to. tuv dvdpuiruv dcpavL^ovo-qs. 
On this a Byzantine annotator has commented : vpLe'ts curepecrTaToi, i)p:eis 8e to 
twv XpurTiavuv yevos Zvdeov /ecu evGefitcTaTov (Scholia, i. 463). 

4 i. 133, 7-8. 

5 i. 152, 1-3: Srj\ov...oTL tt)s HuKpaTiKijs woXiTeias u^etrai r& vvv Trapa8i.86p.eva 
Kal SevTepav dv e"x 0L A 167 "' ^Keivyjv Ta^tv. 



270 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 

them no share in political power. And the Egyptian military 
caste, being wholly specialised for war, is inferior to Plato's 
class of auxiliaries, who share with the guardians in the higher 
education 1 . It is evident that Proclus would have been able 
to criticise shrewdly the analogy often drawn between the 
republic of Plato and the hierarchical order of mediaeval 
Europe. 

A prayer to Athena, conceived in a generalised and sym- 
bolical way 2 , may have suggested Renan's famous prayer on 
the Acropolis 3 . 

The resistance of prehistoric Athens to the extension of a 
Titanic or Gigantic world-power, Proclus accepts as fact re- 
stored from actual records; but he assigns to it also a cosmic 
meaning. Athens represents the higher cause, like the 
01 ympian gods in the myth of the giant- war. The dominion 
of the kings of Atlantis, before it is broken, succeeds in pre- 
vailing over a portion of the higher order. This is in accord- 
ance with the frequent enslavement found to take place of the 
last in the superior order to the first in the inferior 4 . Of the 
kings of Atlantis the power is celebrated, of the Athenians the 
virtue 5 . Their virtue, which prevails over power, is a whole 
including philosophic Wisdom as the higher associate of war- 
like strength. 

Discussion of the meaning of prayer is suggested by the in- 
vocation of the gods 6 . Proclus finds its end to be ultimately 
mystical 7 . At every point in the series of existences, it is 
possible to turn back to the Highest from which all proceed ; 
for production is not merely continuous through the inter- 
mediate stages, but direct even to the lowest, and so the re- 
turn also at every step can be direct 8 . The virtues by which 
the mystical unification is to be attained are especially the 

1 i. 151, 19-28. Cf. i. 154, 18-20, where the theoretic class (to ttjs <ppovrj<rem 
eiriixeKotinevov /cat deuprjTLKov) is found to be marked off from all the special- 
ised classes, including the priests. 

2 i. 168-169. 3 In Souvenirs d'Enfance et de Jeunesse. * i. 182-183. 

5 i. 185, 7-10: tois fxev ' ArXavTlvocs /ulovov dirovefiec ttjv 8vva/j.iv...Tovs de 'Adrj- 
vaiovs k pare iv (pycri. tt)s dwa/xews 8ia ttjs oXtjs aper^s. 

6 Timaeus, 27 B. 7 i. 211, 24: reXevraia de ij evuais. 

8 i. 209, 19-20: ovdevbs yap cupeaTrjKe to detov, dXKa iracnv e£ 'Lvov TrdpeaTi. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 271 

triad, faith, truth, love; with hope, receptivity of the divine 
light, and a standing apart (eWrao-t?) from all else. 

After a dissertation on the nature of "becoming" in the 
world, Proclus finds again that Plato sets out from theory of 
knowledge; which begins not by examining things, but by 
asking what the mind can know 1 . To learn the meaning of 
"being" and "becoming," we must discover in what way 
each is known. To try to find out directly what they are in 
their own nature would lead only to confusion 2 . In defining 
"being" as the object of thought and reason, "becoming" as 
the object of opinion, Proclus of course simply repeats Plato; 
but he soon goes on to a notable development. To explain 
how he came to put the question in the way he did, we have 
to remember the age-long controversies of Epicureans, Stoics 
and Sceptics on the universal criterion 3 . Returning from 
these to Plato, but bearing them in mind, he insists on Plato's 
breadth as compared with other thinkers in assigning a place 
to all the criteria. The soul is not only unitary, but also mani- 
fold ; and so there is a place for intuitive thought (vovs, vorjais), 
for reason or understanding (X070?, hiavota), for opinion 
(Soga), and for sense-perception (aladricns;). But to judge 
belongs to the soul as a unity. What then is its common 
power of judgment? Discursive reason (\6yos), answers 
Proclus. Whatever the human mind at one extreme may 
grasp by intellectual intuition, or at the other extreme may 
apprehend from experiences of sense, it must, for proof, be 
able to assign the grounds of its belief through an articulate 
process expressing itself in general terms 4 . 

The mystical state beyond mind by which the One is 
directly apprehended, Proclus assigns from this point of view 
to a kind of "spurious intellect" {v66o<$ vovs) comparable to 

1 i. 242, 15: 6 diro ruv yvuxrewv diopter /j.6s. 

2 i. 242, 19-21 : a\X' el (xev avrrjv i(p' eavTTjs rr\v tQv irpayixdroju (pvcnv r}fiiv 
irapeK.eKeticra.TO drjpciu, '4\adev clv dcra(peias i/inrXrjcras tt\v avinracrav didaaKaXiav. 

3 I note in passing that the phrase of Xenophanes, 86kos 5' iirl irdai rfrvKTai, 
is interpreted as meaning: "The universal criterion is opinion" (i. 254). 

4 i. 254-255. Proclus mentions that he has developed his view at greater 
length in a commentary on the Theaetetus. This we do not possess; but there 
is some restatement later in the present commentary. 



272 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 

the "bastard reasoning" by which, according to Plato, that 
which afterwards came to be called Matter is seized without 
sensation 1 . This of course does not mean that the apprehen- 
sion of either of these extremes is illusory; the apprehension 
of that which is beyond intellect by a power that is also be- 
yond it is indeed superior 2 ; but the distinctly formulated 
doctrine is that the common test is ultimately coherence in. 
a total system of knowledge 3 . Neo-Platonism in its finished 
form thus presents itself, if we are to give it a definition, as 
in principle a decidedly circumspect rationalism 4 . 

On the theory of beauty in art, the discriminating attitude 
of Plotinus was maintained by Proclus. Works of plastic art, 
he says, are beautiful not by mere imitation of generated 
things, but by going back directly to the source itself of their 
beauty in its Idea. To what was said by Plotinus 5 , he adds 
that if Phidias could have raised his mind beyond the Homeric 
Zeus to the metaphysical conception of Deity, he would have 
made his work still more beautiful 6 . This, however, does not 
imply aversion from the beauty of the world. Even those who 
talk abusively about the Demiurge, he remarks, alluding to 
the Gnostics, have not dared to say that the world is not most 
beautiful; on the contrary, they say that its beauty is a lure 
to souls 7 . 

The immediate cause of the cosmic order Proclus finds to 

1 Timaeus, 52 B: avrb 8e fier' dvaiadijaias airrbv Xoyiafi^ tlvl vodu). On the 
theories concerning the "Platonic Matter," see above, pp. 70-1. 

2 i. 257-258. The scholiast has an admiring note: rl% ova dv <re Bavixdaeie 
nai xdptras fj.eya.Xas es del fiefxvqaeTai, <pi\e ILpdicXe. vodv vodov \e"yei to £v ko.1 
olov avdos tt]S tf/vxv* (i- 472). 

3 Cf . i. 283, 5-11. The grasp of the whole by " enthusiasm " is characteristic 
of philosophy at its highest; but it does not dispense the philosopher from 
subsequent proof of his propositions. This is illustrated by the procedure of 
Timaeus. 

4 Cf. i. 351, where the caution of Plato is contrasted with the extreme con- 
fidence of some other philosophers, such as Heraclitus, Empedocles and the 
Stoics. 

5 Enn. v. 8, 1. See above, p. 90. 

6 i. 265, 18—22: e7rei nai 6 Qeidias 6 tov Ala Troirjaas ov irpbs yeyovbs air£fi\e\pev, 
d\V eh 'ivvoLav d0t'/cero rod Trap '0/xr]pip Aios' et 8e rrpbs avrbv r)8vi>aT0 top voepbv 
avaTtiveo-dai deov, drjXovort. /cdAXtov av direreXeae to olxeiov 'epyov. 

7 i. 333, 6-9. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 273 

have been described correctly, by a distinction of Plotinus, as 
intellect immanent in the world 1 . This mediates between the 
world and the supra-mundane intellect which contains the 
Ideas. While the higher reality — "the divine intellect that is 
the cause of the whole creation 2 " — is not subject to the flux 
that it sets in order, this flux of things itself is not merely 
something external set in order, but pre-exists in a manner 
in its ever-productive source 3 . What he desires to make clear 
by these distinctions is the continuous intellectual necessity 
that runs through the whole and the parts. He cannot, with 
Aristotle, admit any element of the casual: that there is no 
such thing follows from Aristotle's own recognition that the 
universe is one system 4 . 

The things of nature, but not those of the instrumental arts, 
are formed on the model of the Ideas 5 . If Plato in the Re- 
public speaks of the "bed in itself" and the "table in itself," 
this is easy illustration for learners, not formal doctrine. The 
ideas that find expression in the mechanical arts are there- 
fore, according to Proclus, at a greater remove from reality 
than "natural kinds." They are only "here," not in the in- 
telligible world, and they are "made." The ideas embodied 
in nature are not made 6 . 

That the Good — not properly an Idea, though so called' — 
is beyond Intellect, means for Proclus ultimately that the 

1 i. 305, 16—20: IlXwriVos 6 0iX6<ro0os 8ittov /xev viroTiderai tov 8rjfj.iovpy6v r 
tov /niv iv T(£ voT)T(f, tov 5i to Tjyepiovovv tov ttcivtos, \ey€i 5t opdws ' <:0~ti yap 
ttws Kai 6 vovs 6 iyKoa/juos drjfuovpybs tov iravrds. 

2 i. 317, 17: vovs deios ttjs oXrjs iroi-qaews atrtos. 

3 As it is put in one passage, yfreais must be included among the causes 
that precede the generated world (i. 325-328). 

4 i. 262. In the Philebus, he adds, causation is further generalised by its 
application to things mixed. This means, in modern language, that the 
causes are to be sought not only of events, but of collocations. 

5 i. 344, 21-24: aire'iKaaTai de irpbs t6 votjtov to, l-pya ttjs (ptiaeus, oi>xl Kal to, 
kcltcl t^x v V v > us ovde to. Had' €Kao-T<x dcupicr/j-evcos, d\X' at en clvtois kou>6tt]T€S. 

6 i. 344, 13-14: tuv 8e Ideuv (as distinguished from twv ivTavda ideuv) ovk 
idTi drj/xiovpyds. 

7 See, for example, i. 424-425 : Tayadbv is not tl twv d§<2v, nor yet 6\ov t6 
vot)t6v, but 7r/)6 ttolvtwv tQiv votjtuv. Cf. in Eemp. i. 286-287. The ground for 
identifying the Idea of the Good in the Republic with the One is of course that 
it also is said to be beyond Being : cf . in Parm. 1 097, 1 1-20. Necessarily there- 
fore it is not properly an Idea; for the Ideas are at once being and thought. 

W. 18 



274 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLTTS 

world is a teleological order 1 . The highest cause being the 
Good, it follows that goodness is highest in each. Merely to 
assert, however, as many do every day, that "God is good," 
implies no insight. Without virtue, as Plotinus said, " God is 
a name 2 ." 

Causation, we have already seen, while embracing the Ideas 
and their manifestation, includes more. The causal series be- 
gins with the One and Good, and descends to Matter unformed 
by the Ideas. Since the Qne before Being, with a certain co- 
existent infinity that precedes the One as Being, is its cause, 
Matter is in a sense both good and infinite 3 . Only by abstrac- 
tion is the world of material things described as a godless 
realm of disorder, such as Plutarch and Atticus 4 and those 
who took the imagination of the creative Demiurge literally, 
supposed it to have been in the beginning. In the description 
of it as such, Plato imitates the theological poets, with their 
wars of the Titans against the Olympians 5 , but his own mean- 
ing is philosophical. For the circumstantial refutation of 
Atticus, Proclus takes over the argument of Porphyry 6 , who 
seems to have put it very clearly that in the cosmogony of the 
Timaeus Plato intended to indicate the factors into which the 
composition of the ordered world can be analysed ; body, con- 
sidered in abstraction from formative intellect, having no 
order of its own 7 . The saying of Timaeus that it was not 
lawful 8 for the best to produce anything but the most beauti- 
ful, is taken as meaning that Right which is identical with 
Necessity (©eyiu? with 'Avdjfcr)) 9 presides over the universal 
order. 

When the Demiurgus is spoken of as reasoning (Xoyiard- 

1 i. 369, 4: 5ia ravra fiev ovv ttjv reXiKr/v alriav tt\v KvpioirdTrjv dpxv v irpoo-r)- 
yopevae. This refers to Tim. 29 e. 

2 See above, p. 86. 

3 i. 385, 12—14: 77 v\r) Trpbeicriv l/c re tov evbs /ecu ex rrjs direipias ttJs irpb tov 
hbs ovros, ei Be /3otf\ei, Kai dtrb tov evbs 5vtos Kadbcrov earl dvvd/xei 6v. 5ib ko.1 
dyadbv vrj eari teal aireipov. 

4 Atticus lived in the reign of Marcus Aurelius. On his doctrines, see 
ZeUer, iii. 1, pp. 808-810. 

5 i. 390-391. 6 i. 391-396. 7 i. 394, 25-31. 

8 Tim. 30 A : 0e>is 8e oiir t\v oijr eari. 

9 i. 396-397. Cf. in Remp. ii. 207, 19-22. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLTJS 275 

/zez/o?), this does not imply the uncertainty of deliberation, 
but means that there is a regular causal succession from the 
general order of the world to the special orders of its parts 1 . 
The mindless itself, Proclus subtly argues, is prefigured in 
mind, but always under the form of intellect, not as a "mind- 
less idea," which is impossible 2 . Thus, while there are par- 
ticular bodies without a soul of their own, and particular 
souls that are irrational, there is no part of the world which, 
as a part of the whole, is not animated, and no soul that does 
not, as part of the whole of soul, participate in intellect 3 . By 
participating in mind through the mediating stage of soul, the 
world is the most beautiful, by participating in the super- 
intellectual good through mind, it is the most divine of works 4 . 
The question whether there may not be more worlds than 
one is discussed at some length. All views were held: that 
there is one world, that there are many, and that there are 
infinite worlds 5 . Proclus decides with Plato that there is one 
world, on the ground that the unity of divinity has its neces- 
sary manifestation in unity of system. Some, it appears, 
argued that there may be many worlds formed according to 
the one pattern of a world, as there are many men formed 
according to the Idea of Man, 6 avrodv Op cotton 6 . The reply of 
Proclus amounts to this : that man is at a greater remove from 
the archetype than the system to which he belongs, and so is 
more pluralised. In the ascent from the pluralised forms, if 
there is to be continuity, we must at last reach an all-inclusive 
whole, most resembling the pattern as absolutely one. We 
thus necessarily arrive at the unity of the universe (to irav). 

1 i. 399, 18—20: 2<tti yap 6 \oyiap.bs t<2v p.ep<2v 8irjpr)p.epr) St^oSos Kai f? 5ta- 
KeKpifievT] t<2v irpayp.aTuv curia. 

2 i. 399-401. 3 i. 407. 

4 i. 409. The question, how the world as a whole is not made inferior to the 
superior parts of itself by the addition of worse parts, is answered by an 
anticipation of Mr G. E. Moore's principle of "organic value" : el yap to p.iv 
iuTiu kv r<£ 6\(p KpeiTTOv, to 5e x^P ov ^ 7rc *' s T0 o\° v ou KaTadetaTepov tov iv ai/Tcp 
tcpdaaovos Trpocrd^Krj tov x ei P 0V °s yeyove; XveTai 8e to airopov, 8i6ti tov x € ' l P 0V0 ^ 
rj Trpbs to kputtov o~ijvTat;is e x u iroiel to 6\ov Kai TeXeiov, Srau 8e acrvyK\(oo~Ta dXX^- 
Xots y, T-qviKavTa ij pu^is tov x e ' L P 0V °s a<f>avL£ei tt]v tov tcpe'iTTOVos Svvap.iv (i. 423- 
424). 

5 i. 436, 10-12. 6 i. 439, 22-25. 

18—2 



276 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 

This admitted, he is not inclined to dogmatise with complete 
theoretical confidence about the number of systems there 
may be within it 1 ; but actually he holds to the cosmology 
common to Plato, Aristotle, and the orthodox science of later 
antiquity, for which the universe was one finite world, with 
the spherical earth at the centre, surrounded by revolving 
spheres bearing the heavenly bodies. The positions taken by 
these go through certain revolutions which bring back at 
intervals precisely the same relative order; and so the move- 
ment of the whole is cyclical. This is the outline; but within 
it he shows himself to the end eager to find and discuss as 
many open questions as possible. 

The first question raised in detail is about the elements of 
the world. These Proclus tries to determine by relation to the 
senses of which they are the objects. Fire and earth he dis- 
tinguishes, after Plato (Tim. 31 b), as the elements that re- 
spectively give visibility and tangibility to the phenomenal 
world of becoming. The senses of sight and touch, by which 
they are perceived, are extremes; the object of touch being 
perceived immediately, that of sight not immediately 2 . Theo- 
phrastus asks, in criticism of Plato, why are not the other 
senses also taken into account? The reply is, that the external 
world is known to us by actual touch directly, by sight in- 
directly ; actual taste, hearing or smell is no necessary part of 
our perception of the object. Not weight, Proclus remarks, 
but tangibility, is the characteristic property of earth 3 . The 
physical and the mathematical solid are distinguished, the 
first as tangible, the second as intangible 4 . Of these the 
former is primary, as the first resistant 5 . 

To bring together in one world the two most opposed 
elements, there is need of a mean or means. These of course 

1 i. 452, 12—15: el 8e \eyois, on 8et /ecu aWas alrias elvai Sevrepas, irpbs 
fjLepiKurepa irapo.deLyp.aTa iroiodcas, ed p.kv Aeyeis, If 8e op-ws ^uXdrrets to irav. 

2 ii. 6, 10: to p.ev d/xecrws aladrjTOP, to Se ovk ap.eo~h)s. 

3 ii. 11, 20: ov yap to fiapos l8lov yrjs, dWd to aiTTov. 

4 ii. 13, 3—4: (pvaucbv yap aXXo GTepebv koX p.adr\paTiKhv d\\o, to p.ev avacpes, 

to 5e CLTTOV. 

5 ii. 13, 10-12: irpwTov ovv amov t\ 777 Kal irp&Tov avTiTVirov /cat 5td tovto 
irp&Tov (TTepeov. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 277 

are found to be the other two elements of air and water. 
Here it is interesting to notice how Bruno long afterwards 
partly took over and partly modified the physical theorising 
of Neo-Platonism ; bringing in the "bond 1 " between fire and 
earth in much the same way. As with Bruno, so already with 
Proclus, metaphysically and physically everything is in every- 
thing; fire has something of the nature of earth, and earth of 
the nature of fire, and both participate in moisture 2 . In some 
bodies in the universe fire predominates, in others earth. This 
again was taken over by Bruno, who follows theNeo-Platonists 
in omitting the "fifth element" imagined by Aristotle as the 
substance of the heavenly bodies. Where he differs is in re- 
jecting also the notion, retained by Plotinus and Proclus, that 
the fire in the heavenly region is a finer or purer fire 3 . For 
him, not only the same elements, but the same kinds of the 
same elements, are universal 4 . 

In exactitude of thought, Proclus, for all his antiquated 
cosmology, is still in advance of the revived Platonism of the 
early modern period, and, by his remarks on the order of the 
sciences, suggests comparison rather with later thinking. 
When he says, for example, that things physical are images 
of things mathematical 5 , he means definitely that science has 
to proceed from mathematics to physics. At the same time, 
this insistence on the intellectual order is guarded by the 
recognition that physics is not simply applied mathematics. 
The sciences form indeed a continuous series ; but the physical 
point of view introduces complications that do not permit of 
mathematical accuracy 6 . In each body are these three, num- 
ber and mass and force 7 . There is on these subjects a pre- 

1 ii. 18. 

2 ii. 26, 24—31 : fUfteiTou yap Kal Tavry tov vorjrbv KocrfJ-ov 6 alad-qrbs, Kal wcnrep 
iv e/cetVy iravra iv iraalv icrriv, ctW oiKeiws iv eKaGTi$,...rbv avrbv rpbirov Kal 6 
aladrjTos k6<t/j.os iravra £x eL Kara irdcras eavrov rets fioipas ' /cat yap to irvp nadoaov 
dirrdv icrri, yrjs /ierexet, Kal rj yrj Kadbcrov bparbv, irvpos, Kal vyporrjTos eKarepov. 

3 ii. 44, 1: to ovv elKiKpivks irvp ev ovpavu. Cf. ii. 49, 15: iv ij> Tcavruiv at 
aKpoTrjTis etVt. 

4 With the qualification about differences of kind, stated above, the same 
elements are universal for Proclus. See iii. 128, 18-19: 7ras fiiv 6 ovpavbs e/c 
vdvruv ia-rl T&v aroixeiuv. 5 ii. 39, 18. 6 ii. 23, 25-30. 

7 ii. 25, 23-24: rod rpiTToO roirov, \4yw 8e apiO/Jiov Kal oyKov Kal bvvafieus. 



278 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 

cision of thinking which, amid much obsolete science, reminds 
us of Leibniz and Kant and Positivism rather than of the 
Renaissance. 

Of the highly speculative developments that follow, it may 
be said that they are represented most in the most recent 
thought. Pampsychism is very distinctly stated in outline as 
one result of the metaphysical doctrine. The world as a whole, 
though it has no organs of special sense, has a kind of general 
sensibility (olov crvvaicrOrjcns) 1 . This Proems compares to the 
"common sensibility" of Aristotle. From the total common 
sensibility our own is derived 2 . The consciousness of the world 
has a perfection which ours has not 3 ; but of course it is itself, 
in the view of Proclus, not ultimate, but dependent on a supra- 
mundane cause, with which it is united by love 4 . This, he 
recognises, is Aristotelian; but in his own doctrine the love is 
not merely on the part of the things that return ; there is also 
a love at the intelligible source, which the creative cause 
directs in its outward process, iroiybaivwv irpairLheacnv avofi- 
fiarov ookvv "E/dcoto. 5 . 

Thus the heaven or world is a derivative, though not mortal, 
god. On its immortality Proclus insists against the apparent 
concession of Plato that it is by nature dissoluble 6 . The only 
God in the full sense is, however, as he uniformly declares, the 
One. From this proceeds the derived divinity of everything 
else that is called divine 7 . 

When the soul of the world is said to be "elder" as com- 
pared with the body, this does not refer to an order in time, 
but in being 8 . Soul has metaphysically a higher degree of 

1 ii. 83, 23. 

2 ii. 85, 19—21 : irbdev yap Kai iv tj/mv 7} p.ia aio~dr)o~is irpb rQiv ttoWwv io~Tiv ?} 
e/c rod itclvtos; 

3 ii. 84, 28-30: 6 fiev ovv koct/xos £%« tt)v irpwrrju a'icrdrjaiv, afierd^arov , tjpw- 
p.ivt]v T(f yvcoarcp, TrauTeXij, /car' evepyeiav earwaav. 

4 ii. 85, 29—31: ovrw Srj odv /cat to irav <jvvT]Trrai 5t' ^pwros rois irpb avrov, to 
h eKeivois koXKos 8ia tov ev eavTq} (3\e7rov, tovto 8e ov /AepicrTais aladrjaeaip opQv. 

5 ii. 85 (Orph. Fr. 68). This is quoted again, iii. 101, 23. 6 ii. 55-56. 
' ii. 113, 5—10: exaaTov yap iKdeovTai 8ia to irpb avTov irpoae'x&s, o p.ev awpia- 

tikos Koo-p.os Sia \pvxvv, 77 5e ^pvxr) 81a vouv,...vovs 5£ 5ta to ev'...ovKeTi 8k rb ev 
oi ' a\\o debs, d\\a Trpcorws debs. Cf. i. 363, 20-23. 
8 ii. 115, 3: r?? rd|et ttjs ovcrlas. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 279 

reality: in time, as regards the whole, soul and body are per- 
petually coexistent. Yet in a sense the soul is older as regards 
time; for its time and motion are prior (again metaphysically) 
to the time and motion of body 1 . 

To the objection of Theophrastus that, since the soul is a 
primal thing, its generation (the -^vyo^ovia of the Timaeus) is 
not a rational problem 2 , Proclus answers that what is set 
forth as an account of its generation is to be understood 
scientifically as an analysis. Since the soul is not only a unity, 
but also in another aspect a plurality, it can in a manner be 
anatomised like the physical organism 3 . The parts into which 
it can be resolved by analysis are its constituent powers and 
energies. These are numerable, not innumerable like the parts 
of body, with its infinite divisibility 4 . For the unitary nature 
in soul is not divisible into like parts 5 . Of course the parts of 
soul never exist by themselves ; but in a manner they can be 
distinguished in time because the soul cannot energise with 
all its powers at once, but only successively. Every soul 
contains both Limit and Unlimited (irepas and aireipov), being 
at once unitary as dependent on Intellect, and in infinite 
process as associated with the dispersion of body. The limit 
of the soul of the world is more unitary and its infinity more 
comprehensive than those of all other souls; for not every 
limit is equal to every limit and not every infinity to every 
infinity 6 . 

Proclus has a careful and skilful argument to show that the 
soul cannot be literally a mixture of an indivisible and a 
divisible nature 7 . What Plato intends in so describing it is to 

1 This belongs to the subtle theory of time and its kinds, expounded later. 

2 ii. 120. 3 ii. 123-124. 

4 ii. 138. Cf. ii. 152, 11-14: airb to aQ>p.a o$k 'iari. ixepicrbv els ttoX\&, dXX' 
els airetpa, i\ 8e \pvxv 8iripT)p.evr) els 7roXXds ovaias £%et /cat rb i)V(2<rdcu, x <j3 P'- ffT ^l v 
\axovaa acafxaruv viroaracTLv. 

5 ii. 164, 26—28: aSiaiperos els op-ota /cat ravrrj rod ev <rivp.acrii> epos Sia<pepovaa, 
o Statpetrat els op.oia iir aireipov. Cf. ii. 192, 29: 8vo yap p-eprj ra airrd ^vxys ovk 
eari. The unity of bodies is only a phantom of unity: to 8e tQsv o~wp.a.T<j}v ov8e 
awXQs 'iv, dXXd <pdvTaap,a evbs /cat e'tfuXov (ii. 204, 17—19). 

6 ii. 141, 25—27: otire yap irdv irepas laov iravrl Trypan,... ov8e iraaa aireipia 
Trdu-Q direLpia iarj. 

7 ii. 147-154. 



280 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 

convey by analogy the notion of the soul as a distinctive 
existence, combining a unity like that of pure intellect with 
a plurality, not indefinite like that of body, but composed 
of a finite number of powers. To place it in its intermediate 
position by distinguishing these aspects is the proper aim of 
the yjrvxoyovLa, not to show how it was formed out of elements 
that existed before it. It does not even derive the kind of 
divisibility that it has from its relation to body. This belongs 
to the soul in its own nature 1 . As Proclus explains elsewhere, 
the particular soul comes into relation with body because its 
own nature causes it to lapse periodically from the timeless 
unity of intellect ; not because it is drawn down by body into 
a dispersion that is not its own. 

The principles enumerated as constitutive of soul are, in a 
very generalised statement, (1) totality, (2) unity and duality 2 , 
(3) division and harmony, (4) connecting bond, (5) multi- 
plicity with simplicity. Here it becomes especially difficult to 
do justice to the subtlety of the thinking. The insight of 
Proclus into the subject-matter was beyond the tradition 
behind him ; for a part of this was the search for mathematical 
and musical analogies to the mental life. He knows, and 
occasionally says, that the formulae of which he gives an 
elaborate statement do not touch the nature of the soul 3 . 
Plato's use of mathematical terms he compares to the use of 
mythology by the speculative theologians and of symbols 
by the Pythagoreans 4 . It is not a mode of discovering the 
truth about mind and soul, but only of setting it forth — or 
wrapping it up — in external figurations 5 . 

1 ii. 150, 22-24: avri] koX ovcria irrj odaa d/xepicros /cat ycyvofxevr} fxepicmf}, dA\' 
ov irepl adofiaaLV, dXXd icaO' avrrjv fMepiarr] yiyvofievt] Kal /xr]8ev beo/xevrj awfxdrwv 
eh to elvai 6 ean. 

2 The soul is dvoeidrjs in so far as it has two kinds of life, one turning back 
to the unity of intellect which is before it, one exercising care over the things 
of nature which come after it (ii. 242, 17-19). 

3 ii. 174. Cf. ii. 212, 5—6: ov yap eK fiadypLaTLKCov apid/j.u)v ecrrc Kal Xbywu t) 
ovaia T7js if/vxv*' 

4 ii. 246, 4—7 : 6 8e ye TIX&tuv 5t' e7riKpv\j/iv rots fiadynarucoh tvv dvonarwv 
olov Trapa-rreTdo'p.aai.v expv<^ aT0 r V^ T & v Trpayixaruv aKrjdelas, uia-irep oi [j.ev deoXoyoc 
tols p-vdois, oi 5e TLvdaybpeioi rots ctvij.(36Xois. 

5 ii. 247-248. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 281 

Here he is concerned, as he tells us, no longer with theory 
of knowledge, but with ontology 1 . He proposes to set forth 
certain abstract metaphysical principles that are of the soul's 
essence; and, following Plato's imagery applied to the world- 
soul, he does his best to show how these are imaged in mathe- 
matical relations 2 . Primarily, he always refers to the world- 
soul; particular souls have the character of soul imperfectly 3 , 
and are to be understood from the theory of soul in its per- 
fection as rationally defined. In this perfection of reality, it 
is never a mere identity. The principle of unity and identity 
is indeed, according to the true interpretation of Plato, always 
the highest; but an identity with distinction latent in it is 
better than the undistinguished uniformity of the mean 4 . 

Starting from Plato's alternate description of the soul as 
placed within the body of the world and as extending beyond 
it 5 , Proclus shows in more directly subjective language how 
this is true of the relations between body and soul in general. 
Soul in one aspect appears to animate the body from some 
position within. In another aspect, when it turns back upon 
itself, it finds itself not to be included in the mass, but to 
know it as a part of its own existence. The first point of view 
he describes, in his distinctive terminology, as that of the 
7rp6oBo<i, the second as that of the iTricrrpocf)?] 6 . By its outgoing 
powers soul animates the whole mass; in its introspectively 
known reality it remains always beyond the limits of body 7 . 
When soul, in contrast with body, is said to revolve in itself 
and not in place, this means that it thinks itself and finds 
itself to be all things 8 . 

1 ii. 192, 32-33: ov yap tt)v yvujaiv vvv rijs ^i>x%» o\\\d tt)v ovaiav iiricrKo- 
Troijfxeda. 

2 Cf. ii. 195, 11-15: 6 8e rpdiros ttjs irepi ai)Tr)v e^yrja-ews eorw rrj oixrig. <rvp.- 
(pvrjs...dirb tQv eUovuv em ra Tra.pa6elyp.aTa dva7rep.7r6p.evos. 

3 ii. 311, 16-20. 

4 ii. 263, 7-9: to p.evydp ovtw tovtov, ws ev ttj TavTOTTjTt. tt\v erepoTrjTa Kpvtpim 
7re/Hex e "% KpeiTTov eo~Tiv 7) Kara tt)v p.e<fQT7}Ta tt\v \pvx>-K7)v. 

5 Timaeus, 30 b, 34 b, 36 de. 6 ii. 102-103. Cf. i. 406-407. 

7 ii. 282, 25-27: /cat ttclv to o-uu&tikov 6/xotws iravTaxoOev 4\J/vx<>}Tai, Kal Tracra 
V r^ v XV iravTaxddev e^pTjTai tou o~wp.aTOS. 

8 ii. 286, 15-17: roGro [to crQp.a] p.ev yap o-Tpi<f>eTai tottucus, t) Se xf/vxv fwri/cw? 
/cat voepQs, voovcra eavT7)v /cat eavTrjv evplcrKovcra to, wdvTa ovcrav. Cf. ii. 296, 14—18. 



282 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 

Proclus now goes on to discuss, as a question about the 
soul's distinctive being, that "reason" which was found to be 
the criterion of human knowledge. If, he says again, there 
is to be a common knowledge of things knowable, the reason 
(Xoyo?) by which they are known must be a common power 
of dealing with them all, not merely one for one thing, 
another for another; though the aspect of plurality also is 
not to be neglected 1 . This common reason is the realisa- 
tion of the soul's essential part 2 . Through this we describe 
the whole soul simply as rational 3 . It is the one common 
knowledge of the soul 4 . With it Proclus etymologically con- 
nects speech (to Xeyeiv) 5 . The soul's distinctive nature is 
to be reasoning intellect (vovs Xoyt/co?) 6 ; the common form 
to which all its activities are reducible being the discursive 
form 7 . 

This does not exclude a kind of acquired intuition (vovs 
kclO" eljiv), which, in distinction from knowledge proper (eVt- 
ar7]/jL7]), takes in the whole at a glance, while knowledge pro- 
ceeds from cause to effect, by synthesis and division of con- 
cepts 8 . Formed individual intuition, however, like the sense- 
perception from which the knowledge of each person sets out, 
does not speak the last word. The decisive word can only be 
spoken by that which is common; and this for the soul, which 
as such is not eternally unmoved intellect, is movement from 
point to point within a demonstrative system connecting 
principles with applications and applications again with 
principles. 

1 ii. 301, 6-17. 

2 ii. 299, 18—19: evepyeta, u>s av iyu (pa'i-qv, tov ovaiudovs rrjs \pvxys. 

3 ii. 299, 21 : \oyiKT)v \eyop.ev cnrXQs ttjv oXrjv \pvxrjv. 

4 ii. 299, 22—32: 6 5' ovv \6yos ovtos t) pxa eariu yvQais rrjs '<pvxv? K <u ovtos 

€gti.v 6 els \6yos oucrtwc^s, .../cat otd tovto ov /jlovov early dvoeidrjs r\ ^vxV} dXXd /cat 
fxovoeidrjs. 

5 ii. 300, 21—22: \6yos yap eaTiv 77 ipvxy, \6yov 5e evepyrjfxa to Xeyeiv,* cl>s vov 
to voelv, <hs (pvoews to (pveiv. 

6 ii. 301, 7. 

7 ii. 315, 7-8: iraaai yap al yvibcreis aurai /cat Xcr/t/cat eiat /cat p.€Taf3aTucai. 

8 See ii. 313-314, and compare i. 438-439, where Proclus accepts the 
position of Aristotle, that the principles of demonstration are from intuitive 
intellect: 7rds yap 6 airodeiKvvs airb vov \ap.fiavei ras apx&s, vovs 8e c<5 rovs opovs 
yivwaKopiev, tprjcriv 'AptcrroreXrjs, a7rXats e7rt/3oXats ra ovra yivuxTKOVTes. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 283 

On time, starting from Plato's description of it as the 
"moving image of eternity," Proclus reaches a subtlety of 
thought and expression never surpassed, but not easy to make 
perspicuous outside the context of the system. Time, for him, 
has an existence not barely notional 1 , and almost unreal be- 
cause incorporeal, as the Stoics said: on the contrary, its 
existence is more real than that of the things that come under 
it, whether souls or bodies. Soul is in time, as mind or pure 
intellect is in eternity. As eternity (alcov)is more than mind, 
which it contains, so time, in this real significance, is more 
than soul 2 . It measures the duration of all, not merely of the 
mental or the animated: lifeless things, even as such, par- 
ticipate in time 3 . Being in all things, it exists everywhere 
indivisibly 4 . Its essence is to be productive, not destructive, 
since things that are in process need it for their perfection 5 . 
Because of its productive energy, the theological poets have 
called it a god 6 . Considered as subsisting in its unapparent 
causes, it has rightly been deified 7 . The world moves in an 
orderly way (Teray^ez/a)?) 8 because it participates in mind, of 
which time is a mode. Properly, time itself does not move, 
but it is said to be in motion because movements participate 
in it 9 . 

The "parts of time," nights and days and months and years, 
pre-exist in the reality of Time before their manifestation 10 ; 
but this does not mean that there was time before the world. 

1 iii. 95, 10: ko.t eirlvoiav yf/Ckfy. 2 iii. 27, 18-20. 

3 iii. 23, 4 : ov yap eariv oirov fir} trapeGTiv 6 xpbvos. 

4 iii. 23, 17: irauraxov Zg'tiv dfiepiarus. 

5 iii. 47, 2-6 : i] fxh ovv yeveais Kal rrapaK/xd^et /cat 5t' avrb tovto TrpoabeiraL 
rod d,vav€U)<ravTos avrriv xpovov Kal dreXrjs £gtl ttjv dpxv v xal xPVt €L T °v reXeiore'pav 
atirrjv TroiTjcrovTos Kal ir pea (3vre pai> XP^ V0V ' (Contrast Aristotle, Phys. iv. 12, 
221 bl; cf. 13, 222 b 19.) 

6 iii. 27-28. Cf. iii. 39-40. 

7 iii. 89-90. Night, Proclus ingeniously observes, is mentioned by Plato 
{Tim. 39 bc) before day because in the intellectual order the unapparent is 
prior to the apparent. 

8 iii. 28, 21. 9 iii. 32, 2-4. 

10 iii. 36, 6-9: at ydp &<pai>ei5 toijtow atrtat fAovoeidefc den irpb t<2u TreTrXrjdvafJii- 
vusv Kal kir tiireipov dvaKVKKovixivwv, Kal olklv^tol TrpovirdpxovaL rCov Kivovfiivcov 
Kal voepal -rrpb rCov aladrjrwv. Cf . iii. 55, 5-7 : ttcLp yovv to yevofievov £<tti. irpb rijs 
yeveaews d<papus Ibpvixivov ev rrj eavrov atria. 



284 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLTTS 

The "before and after" and the world and time everlastingly 
coexist 1 . Their coexistence expresses itself in a total move- 
ment that may be figured as a circle or a spiral 2 because it 
ever repeats itself. Motion is not time, but temporal intervals 
are measures of motions 3 . 

Like a modern psychologist, Proclus notes the element of 
negativity in " was " and " will be." Yet, though characterised 
by "no longer" and "not yet," they also participate in being, 
as is indicated by their grammatical derivation from the verb 
to be 4 . The things that have their becoming in time are 
inferior to time as regards being. The world of genesis be- 
comes perpetually, but there is no birth or dissolution of time, 
unless one should apply these names to its necessary relations 
of periodic process and return 5 . In this sense, the heaven or 
universe also might be said to be dissolved or born; but this 
can be rightly said only in a sense compatible with the asser- 
tion that for all time it is and was and will be 6 . 

Proclus expressly dissents from the apparent meaning of 
Plato's teleology (Tim. 39 b), by denying that the light of the 
sun came to be in order that we might have a measure of 
time 7 The whole does not exist for the sake of the parts; and 
the time that is as it were perceptible may be considered 
rather as a last result of higher (that is, dominant and im- 
perishable) causes, than as that for the sake of which they 
exist. Time itself is a real measure prior to the notional 
measure 8 in our minds. It is not, as many of the Peripatetics 
have called it, "an accident of motion," for it is everywhere, 
not only in moving things 9 . Proclus equally rejects, as we 
have seen, the view of those who would limit it to the "inner 
sense." External things also have part in it. It measures all 
things, moving or at rest, by a certain permanent unit ([lovas) ; 

1 iii. 38, 8-9: ovk apa /cat to 'tjv' /eat to '&rrai' irpo ttjs tov Koa-fJLOV yevtaeus t\v, 
dXX' oifj.a t<£ Koafioi nal raOra /cat 6 XP 0V0 ^ 

2 iii. 21, 2; 40, 29. 3 iii. 90, 16-17. 

4 iii. 45-46: kclitoi ko.1 to ' 7)i>' /ecu to '^crrat,' kclI el r<£ fir] ovti fxaXkov xapa/e- 
TrjpifreTai to fiev ry fxr]K€Ti, to 8e t<+ pvqbeirw, dW ovv [Jt.€Tex €l 7 e ttolvtus a/jujyen-rj 
tov ovtos, r) ovb^ av /caret Trapey/cXicM* air'' clvtov KaTWVofxdfeTO. 

5 iii. 50, 10-14. 6 iii. 51, 7-12. 7 iii. 81, 23-25. 
8 iii. 83, 19: to eirivo-qfxaTLKov ixfrpov. 9 iii. 95, 15-16. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 285 

and this it does ''according to number 1 ." The time of sub- 
ordinate periods is "the number of the apparent life of each 2 ." 
The whole of cosmic time measures the one life of the whole 3 . 
Descending from mind, its determinations run through the 
system of the animated universe down to all its parts in their 
degrees. Like the nature of Soul, the nature of Time also, as 
between the ungenerated and the generated, can only be 
described by combining opposites 4 . 

To the oppositions in the description of time itself, we must 
add the opposition between the grades of its reality and our 
mode of acquiring knowledge of it. Logically, time as a whole 
is prior to its parts. Genetically, our knowledge proceeds 
from the partial, but orderly, measures of time to the whole 
of time 5 . 

In further discussing the "organs of time," the heavenly 
bodies, which for us mark out different parts of it phenome- 
nally 6 , Proclus repeats some of the physical doctrines already 
set forth. Developing these, he takes occasion to state his 
sceptical position about the machinery of epicycles and eccen- 
trics invented by the later astronomers. That it has not the 
authority of Plato counts with him for something as an 
argument 7 ; but his criticisms are quite direct and rational, 
turning essentially on the artificiality and want of simplicity 
of the devices 8 . He allows their value for convenience of 

1 iii. 19, 2-9: p.hei roivvv /cat r/ rod xpt> vov P-ovds, ...p.hu)v odv 6 XP° V0S T V 
dp.epei iavrov /cat hbov hepyela rrj ££a; ical virb r(bv p.erpovp.h(av Karexopt-hrj irpbeio-t. 
/car' api.Qp.ov. 

2 iii. 90, 18: dpidp.bs rrjs eKaarov fays ttjs i/jL<pavovs. 

3 iii. 92, 24-25. Cf . iii. 95, 5-6 : 6'Xos 5^ icrt xp^os o r£\eios dpidpJbs rijs rod 
iravrbs diroKaraardaeuis. 

4 iii. 25, 19-24: rl 5' av eirj vorjrbv dp.a /cat yevrjrov; rl 5' av etrf fxepicrbv dfia 
/cat d/xepLarov ; aXX' opaas eiri rrjs \pvxi-Krjs ovaias irdvra ravra irpocr]Kdp.eda, /cat 
ov8 i aXXws Swdp-eOa rijs p.ec6ri)Tos ravrrjs KaraKparrjaai TeXews et p.rj rpbirov nvd 
rots dvTi.Keip.hois eir'' avTTJs xPW a ' L l x ^ a ' 

5 iii. 55, 9-12: avrbs p.h dirb ruv bXucurepuv eis r& p.epiKu>repa irpoeicriv &XP L 
/cat rCov ecxdruiv olov fywv /cat <pvrQv, y\plv 5e dirb ru>v p.epiKd>v p.h, rero.yp.hiav 
de p-trpuv 6Xws ylyverai yvwpip.os. 

6 iii. 39. 7 Cf. ii. 264, 19-21. 

8 iii. 56, 28-31 : ovbk yap avrai to et'/cos e'x ov<XLV a ' L virodecreis, aXX' at p.h rrjs 
dirXoTyros dtpio-ravrai. rQiv delwv, at 8e Cicnrep virb p.r)xav7js viroridevrai rrjv kIvtjclv 
tQ>v ovpaviwv, iaK€vupr)p.hai irapd rCov veurepwv. 



286 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 

calculation; but, he says, they remain only an affair of 
specialist calculators, who miss the nature of the whole, 
which Plato alone laid hold on 1 . Returning to the subject, 
he admits their usefulness as means of analysing complex 
motions into simple ones 2 . In this they are not vain, although 
no such mechanisms exist in nature 3 . What he desires is to 
arouse attention and to stir up more exact inquiry 4 . His own 
suggestion is that, without any such hypotheses, we may 
suppose the planets, in accordance with their intermediate 
position in the universe, to revolve according to types of 
motion intermediate between the circular and the rectilinear. 
For cause, he can only assign regularly changing impulses 
from the planetary souls 5 . The philosophic insight, as in the 
case of Bruno and Kepler, whose astronomical conceptions 
were of course larger but whose causal explanations are not 
in advance of this, was in discarding the external contrivances. 
A genuinely scientific explanation was not reached before 
Newton; and this, when it came, had what Proclus calls the 
simplicity of divine things. 

With Proclus, the divinity of the earth is as much an article 
of faith as the divinity of the stars. The Earth, he argues 6 , 
cannot be a mere inanimate mass. If it were such, of course 
it would not be divine; for, as Theophrastus says: ovSev tl/alov 
avev i/ruY^}? 7 . From the mind of the Earth, "our nurse," as 
Plato calls it, our own mind receives impulses 8 . Taking up 
the phrase of Plato, that it is "the first and eldest of the gods 
within the heaven," Proclus shows how the element of earth, 
though darker and more material, as some insist, exceeds the 
other elements in the comprehensiveness with which all are 

1 iii. 96, 31-32: koXt] p.eu 77 eirivoia kclI ipvxcus ifXTrpeirovaa Xoyixcus, tt?s 8e 
t<2v 6\o)v aaroxoi <pvaeus, rjs jj-ovos avreXd^ero TlXdruv. 

2 iii. 148-149. 3 iii. 146. 

4 iii. 149, 5—8: dXXd ravra ixkv iTriardaeois a£ia, ical did tovto kcu wXeovdKis 
avrd roh (piXodedfiocriu et's eirl<jKe\j/Lv irporelvu ko\ dveyeipio iv avrdis ical ras irepi 
Tovrcav ctKyM/SeoT^pas KaTavorjceis. 

5 iii. 147. 6 iii. 135-136. 

7 iii. 136, 1. Cf. ii. 122, 16, where the same quotation from Theophrastus 
occurs 

8 iii. 136, 26—28: el yap 5tj Tj/xerepa rpocpos ecmv, oi Be oVrcos rjfieis \f/vx^ xa-l 
voes, kot' ttceiva av p.dXi.a'Ta reKecriovpybs 7]/j,<2u et'77, tov ypArepov Kivovaa povv. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 287 

represented in it 1 ; whence its generative potency; for, as it is 
at the end of the outward progression, it is also at the begin- 
ning of the return. Evidently we are here much nearer to 
Bruno's exultation that the earth also is one of the stars than 
to the mediaeval view which made it the dregs sunk to the 
lowest depth. 

The view of some ancient commentators, adopted by Grote 2 , 
that according to Plato (Tim. 40 bc) the earth revolves on its 
axis, is discussed but rejected. As in the cosmology of Proclus 
himself, so in his interpretation of Plato, it is stationary at the 
centre of the universe 3 . This does not imply that in magni- 
tude it is first. He knows that it is smaller than the sun, and, 
as Aristotle had said, insignificant in bulk compared with the 
whole. 

On another much-debated passage of the Timaeus (40 de), 
which some, both in ancient and in modern times, have held 
to be ironical 4 , while some have regarded it as seriously 
deferential, or even as commending literal faith in the popular 
stories about the gods, Proclus has a brief but interesting dis- 
quisition, in which he makes no reference to either view. We 
cannot, Timaeus is made to say, disbelieve those among us 
who, according to their own assertion, were descendants of 
the gods, when they tell us, even without probable or demon- 
strative evidence, things concerning their ancestors. Now 
Proclus undoubtedly held that the world is full of divine 
powers, of the nature of minds and souls 5 . Such powers he 
treats nominally as the gods or angels or daemons or heroes 
(in this order of dignity) of the popular stories; but for the 
whole Neo-Platonic school, as has been said, these stories 
themselves are simply not true. In accordance with this 
general position, his method of interpreting the passage of 
Plato is to rationalise it without irony. What is meant by 

1 In his physical as in his metaphysical theory, we know, all things are 
in all. 

2 See Plato, 3rd ed., vol. iii. p. 257. 3 iii. 136-138. 

4 See above, p. 143, n. 3. 

5 iii. 155, 9-12: el y&p o\os 6 k6<xij.os debs evdai/uLuv eariv, otitev i<m ruv 
Gvixir\7)potivTO)v avrbv fiopiuu ddeov ko1 dirpouorjTov. el de /ecu deov iravra /ier^xet 
/ecu" irpovolas, delav ^Xa^e <p6<riv. 



288 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLTTS 

the knowledge that some have of their divine ancestors is 
this : while all souls are children of gods — that is, are linked 
by causation to higher intellectual powers — not all know their 
own god ; but some who have chosen the mode of life assigned 
to a certain divinity — for example, Apollo — do know it, and 
are therefore called children of gods in a special sense 1 . From 
these, whose knowledge is a kind of enthusiastic insight, 
others, if they will apply their minds even without this 
enthusiasm 2 , may learn of what nature the divine powers are. 

On the whole, it may be said that while Plato had less 
respect for mythological modes of expression than his succes- 
sors, his thought, on its positive side, remained more dependent 
on them. In denying that the cosmogony of the Timaeus 
really meant creation by an act or acts of volition, they were 
doubtless right; but the meaning they found in it is certainly 
not on the surface. On the other hand, their own use of 
mythology is transparent. In all his fanciful genealogies of 
gods, taken over from the elaboration of myths by the theo- 
logical poets, the underlying thought of Proclus is quite 
clearly the continuity of metaphysical being. The great prob- 
lem of knowledge, he puts it, is to find mean terms 3 . And 
historically, it seems very probable, the Leibnizian doctrine 
of continuity, and so in the end the continuity that has in- 
sensibly become one of the presuppositions of modern science, 
descends from the Neo-Platonic metaphysics. 

In the metaphysical doctrine the element of pluralism, as 
already noted, becomes more evident on closer examination. 
The many minds, says Proclus, exist as something intrinsic in 
the divine mind, and are ungenerated 4 and uncreated 5 . When, 
in the Timaeus, the mundane gods, i.e., the heavenly bodies, 

1 iii. 159, 29—31 : iracai fikv ovv if/vx&l Bedv iraides, a\\' ov Traaai tov eavrQv 
eiriyvbxrav debv ' al 8e iTriyvovaai /cat ttjv bfioiav eXdfievai faty KaXovvTai 7rat5es 
dewv. 

2 iii. 160, 23-24. 

3 iii. 153, 13—15: Kal oXcos tovto Kal /xeyco-Tbv 4<tti rrjs iTTLO-T-qpvqs %pyov, to t&s 
fieaoTrjTas Kal rds irpoodovs tuv ovtwv XeirTovpyeiv. 

4 iii. 205, 26-27: dveKcpoiTTjTOL yap daiv ol v6e$ tov ddov vov Kal ayevrjTOt. 
TravTeXQs. 

5 iii. 209, 18-21 : ol 5e voes ol rah ij/uxcus aucodev eTrifiefiyKOTes ovk av Xeyoivro 
'epya tov 7rarp6s * oide yap yeveaiv icrx^v, dXX' ayevqTus ii-e<f>aur)o~aj>. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 289 

are said to be indissoluble except by the will of the Father, 
who wills to preserve and not to destroy them, the real mean- 
ing is that they are indissoluble (aXvroi) by their own nature 
in so far as that nature is divine. They are said to be at the 
same time resoluble (\vroi) not in the sense that they are 
destructible, but because, not being perfectly simple, their 
components, as contained in universal Mind (signified by the 
Father and Maker), can be discriminated in thought; in other 
words, they are mentally analysable 1 . In the end, their inde- 
structibility, not dependent on any will, is stated with em- 
phasis 2 . Plato's expressions are finally interpreted as meaning 
that they are indissoluble and immortal in a secondary sense ; 
not as simple and eternal beings, but as synthesised in their 
pre-existent causes (figured by the common bond, avvhea-fio^;), 
and as having a perpetuity of becoming in time 3 . 

Of human souls, alternately descending to birth and re- 
ascending, there is a particular life that is altogether mortal. 
This the historians, in their summarising manner, declare to 
be the irrational life. Proclus, they say, only preserves the 
rational part of the soul 4 . The actual doctrine of Proclus is 
more subtle and complex. In his view, it is only at the end 
of a cosmic cycle that all the individuality disappears except 
that of the rational soul. The soul then starts from a new 
beginning; but even then it still retains the necessity of re- 
descent ; and this is conceived as a kind of ultimate irrational 
element inherent in its innermost nature. To all the successive 
lives within a cycle, there is attached the soul's permanent 
vehicle, consisting of finer matter 5 , together with certain 
"apices" of sense and motion (a/cpoT^re? rfjs akoyov f&)^?) 6 . 
From these, as from the growing points of a plant, the ir- 
rational life is extended into the system of perceptions and 
habits that subserves each embodiment 7 . This system dis- 

1 iii. 212, 2-5. Cf. iii. 213, 12-18. 

2 iii. 214, 33-35: ovk dpa 8€?\eyetv, on (pdapra /xev iari nad' avrd, did 8e ttju 
^oi!>\t](xlv tov Trarpos dcpdapra /xevei, dXkd /card rr\v avrwv cpvaiv d<pdaprd iarc. 

3 iii. 216-217. 4 See above, p. 156, n. 4. 5 See above, p. 179. 6 iii. 236, 32. 
7 iii. 237, 18— 24: at 8e 7]/x€TepaL i/'i/xcu...£xou<ri ttji' kv tw 6xVP :aTl few d\oyoi> 

oftcrav ws irpbs avrds, Tr\eovd£ov<r<. 8e rip kcll SM^ #Aoycw TrpocrXapL^dveiv, ZnTacnv 
ovcrav t^j h t£ TrvevpLart faj^j,...^ 5e TrpoadrjKT] r^s devripas iarl dvrjToeidrjs. 

w. 19 



290 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLTJS 

appears; but the modifications acquired go on in a latent 
form, and, by carrying the whole soul forward to its appro- 
priate reincarnation, furnish the basis for the reality that 
corresponds to the myths of the choice of the soul, the punish- 
ments in Hades, and so forth. Thus, though the concrete 
individuality in its fullness is dissolved, much more is left 
than in Aristotle's doctrine of the immortality of the intellect, 
even on the interpretation that this refers to the individual 
mind, and not simply to the Deity, as was held by Alexander 
of Aphrodisias, or to the general mind of man, as the Averroists 
later maintained 1 . 

The doctrine held by Theodore of Asine and some of the 
later Neo-Platonists, that the human soul is equipollent with 
divinity 2 , Proclus will not allow to be compatible with the 
teaching of Plato, who indicates the gradation of souls by the 
successive "mixtures" (Tim. 41 d) 3 . In accordance with the 
inferior rank of souls that descend to birth instead of remain- 
ing always among the gods, is the changing of life from thought 
to action, the coming under external necessity, the association 
with perishable things 4 . For the differences among particular 
souls belong to them not from relations to particular bodies, 
as some say, but from their own essence 5 . 

The Demiurgus is described as revealing to the souls the 



1 A theory that our mortal part is resolved at death into elements separ- 
ately imperishable is alluded to as held by some, but is rejected. The unity 
being lost, we could not say that the identity of the reality is preserved; for 
the irrational part is not a mere conflux of lives, but a life one and multiple : 
dXXa tovto Kai icad 1 eavTo /xev cLtottov • rrjs yap evwcrews a7ro\op.eprjs ttws Zti to 
avrb dia/Jt.eveiv <pri<rofJ.ev ; ov yap 4cm fa&v crv/xtpopyjcns i] akoyos, dXXa fxia far] 
TroXueiS^s (iii. 236, 20-23). 

2 iii. 245, 19-21 : ovk dpa aTrodet-6/J.eda tujv veurepuv ocroi ttjv rjfj.eTe'pav ^/vxw 
icrd^LOv dirocpaivovcn. rrjs deias 77 6/j.ooij<tiov rj ovk old' ottws /3od\ovTat \eyeiv. 

3 iii. 246, 27—28 : i] yap ToiaiiT-q fieyaXopprjfioaijvrj irbppw 7-775 HXdruvos eari 
dewpias. It would have been interesting to know more exactly what Theodore 
meant. We are told (iii. 265) that he put forward the remarkable thesis 
that the vehicle of each particular soul is the universe (ttjv tov vavrbs 
<pvatv). 

4 iii. 258, 28-30: to /JLCTapdWeiv ttjv faqv dirb vorjcrevs els irpai-iv, to virb rr,v 
ei\xapp£v7)v reXetV iroTe, to <rvp.[xLyvvcrdai rots iiriK-qpois irpdyfxacriv. 

5 iii. 264, 14—16: ovk dirb tCjv awfiaTUv ovde dirb tuv Toiuivde crxeceuv <u 
5ia<popal tuv ■tyvx&v elcn, Kaddirep <j>aal rives, d\X' dirb rrjs Idias avrQv ovclas. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 291 

nature of the whole and as telling them the fated laws 1 . Dis- 
cussing this, Proclus treats as characteristic of Fate the mani- 
fold connexion of causes 2 , not exclusively natural in the sense 
of mechanical 3 , but, to the souls that come under it, appearing 
to be externally imposed 4 . The natural causation in which it 
consists is really divine as part of the complete order, and is 
only separable from the unitary direction of Providence by 
an abstraction, as in the myth of the Politicus, where the 
world is figured as in a certain period going on by itself. It is 
also not to be conceived as really external to the souls that 
undergo it, but as written in them in the form of laws which 
are realised according to the choices they make. 

Every particular human soul must by inherent destiny 
descend to birth at least once in each cosmic cycle 5 . The rest 
depends on its choice: through this comes subjection to Fate 6 . 
When Plato speaks of the first birth (7rpcorrj yeveais), he means 
descent from the intelligible world to manifestation in time; 
and so, when he goes on to describe further stages of descent, 
this is to be understood as a classification of souls, not as an 
actual genetic order. He cannot mean literally that the first 
birth in time is as a man; that the second, in case the soul 
deteriorates, is as a woman; and that, if the deterioration 
continues, the same soul will become reincarnate as an ir- 
rational animal. Similarly in the Republic, the account of 
the degeneration of political constitutions is really a classifi- 
cation. The stages of descent from aristocracy, through 
timocracy, oligarchy and democracy, to tyranny have no his- 
torical necessity: there is no reason why there should not be 
transition directly from timocracy to tyranny or from aris- 

1 Timaeus, 41 E : tt\v rod iravrbs tptjcriv ?5ei£e, vojuovs re tous elfxapfievovs elirev 

aVTCLLS. 

2 iii. 272, 24-25 : tovto 8e e[fiapp.ivr)<i tdtov, 6 tQv ttoW&v ahiuv eipfibs, rj Ta£i ?, 
i) irepiodiKri xoirjais. 

3 iii. 272, 16-20. 

4 iii. 275, 15—17: 6Ve roiuvv iyicbcrfxioi yeyovacriv ai rf/vx^h tot€ kcll rb Kpdros 
deCovrai ri]S elfxap/JLeinris dvcodev dirb ttjs irpovoias €%qpTr)p.kvQV koX rods vb/xovs viro- 
dix° VTaL T °fo eifxapfxevovs. 

5 iii. 277, 3-7. Cf. iii. 278, 25-27. 

6 iii. 277, 18—20: Kpar-qdeTaai 5e virb rod durjrov et8ovs rrjs fwijs 8ov\ai yiy- 
vovtixl 7-77$ el/j.apfji.4v7)s • xp^tcu yap aureus ws akbyois rb tolv. 

19—2 



292 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 

tocracy to democracy 1 . In the Timaeus, the production of 
all animal souls is figured under that of the human soul, taken 
as a convenient starting-point to set forth, as imaginary 
descent to lower stages, a classification according to rank in 
the scale 2 . What is meant by placing the male of the human 
species first is that the masculine mind is better adapted to 
attach itself to intellect and to principles. Yet, when Socrates 
has to learn from Diotima how to find the way to the Idea of 
the Beautiful, it would be absurd to say that no soul can 
become incarnate at the highest stage as a woman 3 . Is there, 
Proclus goes on to ask 4 , a difference of sex in souls prior to 
birth? He answers that there is, but that the male soul has 
a female element and the female soul a male element: this is 
indicated by the myth ascribed to Aristophanes in the Sym- 
posium 5 . Hence a soul predominantly male may descend to 
birth as a woman, and a soul predominantly female as a man 6 ; 
just as a soul in a particular life may become attached to the 
wrong presiding deity, — may, as we say, miss its vocation 7 . 
For the difference of sex is not a difference of kind, but is 
analogous rather to the differences between modes of life ; and 
the virtues of men and of women are the same. 

Proclus denies that a human soul can ever become the soul 
of a lower animal; though he seems to admit that it might 
attach itself to and direct a brute soul 8 . The language of Plato 
about transmigration into animals he takes to be mythical 9 . 
Its meaning is that every kind of vice ends by embodiment in 
some brutish mode of life; the brutality that there is in in- 
justice, for example, being described as the life of a wolf. 

1 iii. 282. 2 iii. 240. 3 iii. 281. 4 iii. 283. 5 iii. 293. 6 iii. 284. 

7 This is not identical with moral failure in lif e. A soul may guide its course 
wrongly within, or rightly outside, its proper vocation. Proclus minutely dis- 
criminates the cases (iii. 279-280). Vocation itself is not simple: within the 
domain of the presiding deity, the right or the wrong power may be chosen; 
and so there are many possible combinations. The happy life is the life 
completely in accordance with vocation: 6 8e evdai/xuv j3ios iarlv 6 Kara rr\v 
ioibr-qra. tQv rryeixovuv a<popL^bjj.evos (iii. 290, 30—31). 

8 iii. 294, 29-295, 3. Milton's description of the entrance of Satan into the 
serpent is too similar not to recall: compare Paradise Lost, ix. 187-190. 

9 Cf. iii. 293, 30—31 : #A\ws re Kai rod HX&toivos iroWa /ecu dca tuv crv/AfioKuv 

KpVTTTeiU (jTOvba^OVTOS. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 293 

Quite consistent with this view that there is no passage of 
a soul from one species to another is the traditional concep- 
tion, worked into his system by Proclus, of the eternal Man 
as mediating between the individual man and the life of the 
whole 1 . His doctrine of continuity, with its search for means 
between extreme terms, of course serves as the recipient for 
this as a special example 2 . Each human soul is Man and the 
first Man 3 . At the same time, as we have seen, each is not 
only a particular rational soul, distinguished in essence from 
all others, but also contains the roots of differentiating ir- 
rational elements, which pre-exist and survive the body of the 
individual 4 . 

For the body, says Proclus, the way to that which is con- 
trary to nature, and the deprivation of life, produces pain; 
the way to that which is according to nature, and the attune- 
ment with life, pleasure 5 . These affections of pleasure and 
pain he finds to be the sources of the other affections 6 . We 
cannot help being reminded of Spinoza's definitions in the 
third Part of the Ethics 1 . Unlike Spinoza, however, Proclus 
regards the living body as characterised not primarily by its 
conatus, but by perception, to which appetition is secondary 8 . 

The intellectualism (in modern phrase) of Proclus appears 
w r hen he says that the decrees of the Demiurge (Tim. 42 d) 

1 Compare Comte's mnemonic verse: "Entre l'homme et le monde il faut 
l'Humanite." 

2 iii. 298, 5—11: kclI 7rQs yap dwb ttjs tov Koafiov oXov 8i.oiKovar)s $orijs els to 
/.(.epiKuTaTov i<XTiv r) k&9o8os ;...dXXd irdvTws els to fxeaov irpoTepov i) Kddodos, 5 /jlt) 
etTTt tc feov dXXd iroW&v pLajv irepieKTUcbv • ovde yap ei/Qvs tov tov twos dvOpuirov 
irpo(3aX\ei (3lov, dXXd tov dvdp&irov irpb toijtov. 

3 iii. 307, 15—17. Cf. iii. 166, 28: avdpuwov yap Kai tov votjtov icai tov alcr9r]Tbv 
\4yofiev. 

4 Cf . iii. 299-300 : ttjs dpa dXbyov farjs ovk <e(jti. /ca#' exacTOv tov (3lov i^aWayr] 
Kaddirep twv aoj/j-aToiv. 

5 iii. 287, 17-20: tov ydp crcduaros i) fxev iiri to wapa (pvatv 656s Kai r) o-Teprjcris 
ttjs far)s tt)v Xvtttjv direpydfeTai, i) 5e ewl to /card <pvaiv ewdvodos Kai i) irpbs ttjv 
^037]v evapfioais t)8ovt)v. 

6 iii. 287, 22-23 : wpuTovpyd /uev etrri rd 8vo Tavra Trddrj Kai irrjyal tCjv dXXwf 
irad&v. 

7 "Laetitia est hominis transitio a minore ad maiorem perfectionem. 
Tristitia est hominis transitio a maiore ad minorem perfectionem." 

8 iii. 288, 9-13. Cf. Eth. iii. Prop. 7, with Prop. 9, Schol. 



294 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 

are not commands like those of a city or a legislator, but are 
implanted in the being of souls so that these may govern 
themselves. Only thus can the fault be their own if they do 
not 1 . The distribution of souls is not by chance, nor yet by a 
bare will that determines their places beforehand, nor is each 
simply identical with the whole; but there is a total order 
accordant with intellect, in which each takes its part by the 
cooperation of its own will, which is from within 2 . 

The mortal body assumes form before the soul is present; 
and the presence of the merely animating principle is before 
that of the immortal principle 3 . The first is produced along 
with the body 4 . This is always the order of genesis, from the 
imperfect to the perfect by a regular process 5 . In the timeless 
order of being, mind and soul precede body; but this is not 
the order of birth, but, as has often been said, of causal 
derivation. The immortal soul is not bound in relation to the 
body till the body has become compacted into one whole 6 . 

Describing, after Plato (Tim. 43 bc), the troubles brought 
by the nutritive life and the life of the senses, Proclus denies 
that these are troubles of the soul. It is as if one standing on 
the bank were to see his image distorted in all sorts of ways 
by the currents in a river, and were to imagine that this 
affected him in his reality. So it is only the soul's image that 
is tossed about in the stream of birth 7 . This seems almost 
coincident with expressions of Plotinus ; but Proclus goes on 

1 iii. 302, 29-31 : W odv avalrios fj t£ov aixapTrjixaTow 6 6e6s, h reus ovaiais 
avTuv airedtTO roiis elfiap/JLevovs vofiovs. 

2 iii. 304. 

3 iii. 321, 25-29: /xera 5' ovv tt)v epwaiv tuiv ttoWQv koI clvolloIuv i] \f/vxv 
irapaylyverai, irp&TT) fiev i) Bv-qry] iravTws...8evTepa 5e 7) adavaros. 

4 iii. 321, 31: airoyevvaTou /xera rod g&hcltos. 

5 iii. 322, 1-2 : iraaa yap tj yeve<rt.s airb dreXovs apxerat /cat 65<£ Trpoeiaiv iirl 
to riXeiov. 

6 iii. 322, 21—23: Srav o%v £v yeprjrat nal 6\ov to o~u>fia, tot€ r\ adavaTos ^vxv 
7rept clvto KaTaddTcu. In the terms applied to the corresponding patristic 
and scholastic theories, the Stoics were "traducianists," the Neo-Platonists 
"creationists"; at least so far as they held that the rational soul is not 
immanent in the seminal matter, but is superinduced. According to Proclus, 
the attachment is at the moment of birth, when the new body acquires a 
separate existence. \ 

7 iii. 330. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 295 

to oppose the view of Plotinus and Theodore of Asine that 
something in us remains passionless and always thinks l . The 
soul descends as a whole, and errs in its choice both as regards 
action and judgment. The reconciliation of this with what 
goes before is to be found in the distinction between the soul's 
essence and its powers and energies. Its essence indeed re- 
mains identical 2 ; but its powers and energies are perturbable 
throughout ; so that it cannot be said that anything of them 
dwells always in serenity amid the flux. In short, Proclus 
agrees with Plotinus that the trouble is illusory; but he 
asserts against him that the illusion may affect the whole 
soul while it is here, and make it inwardly, not as in a mere 
dramatic representation, unhappy 3 . The return to the 
rational order of the soul is to be accomplished by unbinding 
the Prometheus in ourselves 4 . 



ON THE REPUBLIC 

A.S compared with the commentaries hitherto dealt with, the 
Commentary on the Republic has the advantage of being at 
once approximately complete and more manageable in size. 
It does not, like the others, set out to go over the whole of the 
Dialogue in detail, but consists of dissertations on selected 
topics. The first part is the most generally interesting and 
the most literary of the writings of Proclus; and the second 
contains some of his profoundest thoughts. The drawback is 
the imperfect text of this second part, due to the unfortunate 
condition of the manuscript. Not until 1901 did a complete 
edition appear; and the editor has had to make much use of, 
conjecture. In spite of this drawback, students of Greek 
philosophy may now read the whole with profit; and some, 
if I may judge from my own experience, will find pleasure in 
the reading even apart from any purpose. 

1 iii. 333, 29-30: Trappr)<jia(r6p.e0a irpbs UXojtlvov /ecu rov fieyav Qeodwpov 
airades tl <pv\6.TTovTa% iv tj/juu ko.1 del voovv. Cf. iii. 323. For the position of 
Plotinus, see above, p. 64, n. 5. 

2 iii. 335, 24: rj /xev oiaia TrdpreXQs i] clvtt) diap.e'vei. Cf. iii. 340, 15; 343, 4. 

3 iii. 334. 4 iii. 346. Cf. in Remp. ii. 53. 



296 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 

In the exposition, some points brought out before will have 
to be repeated; but, as elsewhere, I shall try to make repe- 
tition as infrequent as possible. 

Early in the Commentary, we find ourselves again on the 
ground rapidly gone over in the sketch given of the short 
treatises on Theodicy. Matter is not the cause of evils. There 
was no one cause. They arise episodically in a world of strife 
among differentiated existences ; and such a world was neces- 
sary to fill up all the grades of possible being. Of this order 
of the world as conceived in the Neo-Platonic system, mytho- 
log}^ is found to be symbolical. Apollo is the universal poet, 
giving harmony to the cosmos. Ares is a kind of general of 
the forces of evil ; but, since he is conceived as divine, he must 
be regarded as setting wars in motion with insight in relation 
to some imiversal end 1 . The agents of evil in the lower parts 
of the causal chain have not the idea of marshalling it for 
good, having no insight into the whole, and so they become 
liable to punishment for their ill-will ; but the punishment also 
is beneficent. The final victory is always to the good ; but the 
power of the worse may not be destroyed, since the whole 
must consist of opposites. Above strife is the life of intellect. 
Philosophy is the highest kind of fjuovcrucr) and ipwri/a]. The 
soul possessed of it imitates Apollo Musegetes ; for the philo- 
sopher, though this is not obvious to the multitude, is a kind 
of enthusiast 2 . 

This leads up to the predominant purpose of the first part 
of the Commentary; which is in effect to defend poetry and 
mythology against the master. Among Plato's successors, 
Aristotle had vindicated the drama against his indiscriminate 
attack on the imitative arts; Plotinus had shown that sculp- 
ture and painting are not at a greater remove from the Idea 
than the natural things that exemplify it, but, on Platonic 
principles, must go back to something more real because more 
general; Proclus now sets himself to rehabilitate the Homeric 
epic and its mythical stories. 

He cannot indeed formally admit that Plato did not in his 

1 i. 68-69. Cf. ii. 295-296. 

2 i. 57. Here of course Proclus starts from Plato in the Phaedrus. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 297 

own mind see and allow for everything; but his criticisms are 
none the less keen for that. It is of course true that with 
Plato's irony on the poets as teachers there is mixed real 
admiration; and on this Proclus, with something of the 
orator's art, insists, without fully recognising the irony. He 
has, however, no scruple in saying that Plato would have been 
turned out of his own republic both as a poet and as a jester; 
that his underworld is not less terrifying than Homer's, 
against which he protests 1 ; that he borrows some of his own 
myths from Homer as well as from the Orphics 2 ; that if we 
take everything literally he is full of contradictions; that 
these can only be excused by allowing for the dramatist in 
Plato himself and the consequent dramatic element in the 
Dialogues 3 . Finally, he remarks that doubtless the reason for 
Plato's attack on Homer was that he saw his contemporaries 
despising philosophy as useless, and, in their excessive ad- 
miration of poetry, treating it as sufficient for the whole of 
education. We must not, however, blame the divine poet 
for that, any more than we ought to blame the philosopher 
because some, in their admiration of his dialogues as litera- 
ture, have made his style the sole object of their imitation; 
or, Proclus adds, than we ought to blame the Maker of the 
world because particular souls are content to revolve in the 
world of birth without rising higher. But some of these 
things, which it is lawful for him to say to his pupils, they are 
not to repeat to outsiders 4 . 

At the attempt to show that the Homeric myths contain 
the principles of Platonic theology the modern world, having, 
so far as its best minds are concerned, outgrown the mode of 
thought since the seventeenth century, now only smiles; but 
interesting ideas are brought out by the way. The deceptions 
wrought by the gods, as for instance Agamemnon's dream in 
the second Book of the Iliad, are ultimately for the good of 
the deceived; just as the Platonic Socrates enjoins on the 

1 i. 118-119. 

2 i. 168-169. Cf. ii. 110-111 iTovUXaTUPOSTa rotaOra ttX&ttovtos jxev ovSafiQs, 
Kara 5e ttjv xpz' l0 - v T & v TrpoKeifj.ei>a}v del TrapaXajn^duouros /cat xP 0} i J -^ v0V nacre /zero, 
ttJs TrpeirovtTTjs 7rept/3o\?7S /cat oUovofxlas. 

3 See above, p. 160. 4 i. 202-205. 



298 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 

guardians of his State the use of falsehood for the benefit of 
those who have not sufficient insight into their own good 1 . 
Goodness is above truth; and the two, united in the whole, 
often become separated and incompatible in the parts. Why 
are the gods represented as causing one of the Trojan heroes 
to break the truce? They do this not by a mere arbitrary 
external use of him as an instrument, but by bringing into 
action his own predisposition. Thus, though no doubt his 
will is made to contribute towards a cosmic end, he is not 
purely and simply sacrificed to it; the temptation is also for 
the sake of his own soul, as physicians sometimes have to 
bring a physical malady to a head before it can be cured 2 . 

On poetry itself, Proclus has many good observations. He 
anticipates Shelley's thought 3 that in a tyrannically-ruled 
State even those less elevated kinds of poetry which in their 
lowered type bear the marks of that order tend to make those 
who live under a tyranny better and not worse 4 . In placing 
highest the poetry with an element of "divine madness" in 
it 5 , he follows Plato; adding that Plato, as is fitting, puts this 
above every other human art 6 . From an incidental phrase of 
Plato (airaXriv /cal aftarov tyvxv v ) 7 > ne educes a description of 
the poetic mind as receptive of inspiration because not fixed 
in some stable habit of its own, but at the same time resistant 
to miscellaneous opinions and impressions from outside 8 . The 
second order of poetr}^ he finds to be the poetry of wisdom and 
understanding. Of this Theognis is the best example 9 . The 
third kind is the poetry that imitates things as they are or as 

1 i. 116. 

2 i. 105, 26-30: ?5ei yap roiis tQu fxeylo-ruv a8iKr)ixaTuv apZavras avaKK-qdrjval 
Trore Trpbs ttjv 8lkt]U' tovto 8e ovk dv ttotc cvvefiri, /xr) ttjs p.oxQyp'<-as avrQv dva- 
ir\o)6 dai)$ • iroWal yovv r&v £|e«v avevepyyjToi fievovaac ttjs irpoar]Koij<rr}s dep<nreias 
Tvxew advvarovs ttoiovctiv tovs ?x ovTa s- This idea of the Greek theodicy, 
starting from the doctrine of Plato that punishment is for the good of the 
offender, was applied by Origen to the "hardening of Pharaoh's heart"; as 
Proclus applies it here to the "breaking of the oaths." 

- 3 In the Defence of Poetry. * i. 48. 

6 i. 178, 24: fiapia aucppoavvrjs Kpeirruv. 

6 i. 182, 14-16: raiuT-qv 8ij ri]v €K tujv MovaLOP vc^iaTafxivrjv iv rats ctirakcus /cat 
d/Sdrots \pvxo.h ttoitjtiktjv aTdarjs a\X?|S rex^s avOpuirivris ei'/c6ra>s TrpoTidyciv. 

7 Phaedrus, 245 a. 8 i. 181. 9 i. 186-188. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 299 

they appear. In the first case it is the poetry of representa- 
tion; in the second, of fancy 1 . All the kinds are illustrated in 
Homer. 

Several remarks on the relation between ethics and politics 
show the persistence of thought on the subject even when all 
influence of political philosophy on practice had for the time 
ceased. Comparing the virtues of the city and of the in- 
dividual, Proclus allows that, as the city is greater in magni- 
tude, its virtues are more conspicuous: on the other hand, 
they are only images of the virtues in the particular soul, in 
accordance w T ith the rule that greater perfection is found in 
the smaller quantity or number 2 . Plato's ruling class, he 
goes on to show, is selected, though Plato did not expressly 
say so but only implied it, for proficiency in the "musical," 
— that is, literary and ethico-religious — branch of training, 
and not specially for proficiency in the gymnastic or physical 
branch. After their selection, at once for natural capacity and 
progress made, they are to be trained in science and philosophy 
(mathematics and dialectic) 3 . In another passage, he touches 
upon the question whether women should take part in the 
government. The reason, he says, why women, although 
their virtues, according to Plato, are the same as men's, share 
in the highest offices in the first State (that of the Republic) 
but not in the second (that of the Laws), is that in the second 
private property and separate families are permitted. For 
the sympathies of women are by nature with private rather 
than with public interests and with the part rather than the 
whole 4 . This is no doubt the most plausible argument ever 

1 i. 188-192. 

2 i. 217, 10-16: Tip yap SyKip /acts ^vxv* /*«£"<*»' V tt6\is, <et> Kal etebves 
tialv ai TTJs 8\rjs xbXeus dperai t&v rrjs fiids ^vxv*i Kavravda brjirov rov \6yov 
KpaTOvvros, 8$ <p7)<Tii> rot, dpLepiarepa rrj 5vvdp.ei Kparelv tQv els irhciova fxepiafibv 
virofapop.e'vuv, Kal to. £\&ttu /car' dpi.6fj.6y vTepfapeiv rrj dwd/xei t&v irXeibvuv 
Kara rb irovbv. There is a strikingly similar thought in Victor Hugo's William 
Shakespeare. "A beaute egale, le Ramayana nous touche moins que Shake- 
speare. Le moi d'un homme est plus vaste et plus profond encore que le moi 
d'un peuple." 

3 i. 218-219. The point about order in time is not put quite so distinctly 
by Proclus, but seems to be implied. 

4 i. 257, 1-6: Kal yap (rvp.iradi(TTepov <pvaei to drfKv irepl to tdiov tov dppevos- 



300 THE COMMENT ABIES OF PROCLUS 

used against political equality between the sexes: Herbert 
Spencer's argument is practically identical. The answer, on 
the ground taken by Proclus, might be that, since the virtues 
of men and of women are the same, both ought to take part 
in public affairs so that the latent capacity for political virtue 
may be educed in all; for of course Proclus recognised the 
spiritually educative function of the State. It was worth 
while to make this remark because it is essentially his own 
reply to one of Aristotle's arguments against the Platonic 
communism as an ideal. Men, says Aristotle, neglect what 
concerns only the public, and take more interest in what is 
their own. True, answers Proclus, but Aristotle himself has 
pointed out, in reply to those who would have the human 
mind restrict itself to human affairs, that there is also a divine 
part in us with an aptitude for speculative contemplation, and 
with this also we ought to energise as far as the conditions of 
human life permit. So, in politics, we must be taught by 
institutions to turn from our merely private interests to those 
that concern the whole State 1 . 

Before we go on to the abstruser discussions of the second 
part, one position may be selected from various observations 
on psychology and metaphysics, because it is not repeated 
elsewhere, and because it illustrates the advance made by the 
Neo-Platonic school on Plato himself. Proclus notes 2 that 
the perceptive part of the soul (to ala6r}TtKov) is distinct from 
the three classified by Plato (reason, spirit, desire) and is the 
foundation of all. This is, scientifically considered, an im- 
provement on Plato's psychology, which, as Proclus himself 
observes, has primarily a political and educational aim. 

The principal topics of the second part are the celebrated 
puzzle or mystification known as the "nuptial number" (Rep. 
viii. 545-546), and the myth of Er (Rep. x. 614-621). This 
last is dealt with in the circumstantial manner characteristic 
of the commentaries of Proclus generally. 

ovk r\v ovv a<r<pa\es fj.epLcrfj.bv eicayayovra /cat xPVI J -^ TU}V Kai tcuSciw /cat eis yvvaiKas 
ayeiv ttjv tQv oXcov apxyv, vir' avrrjs ttjs <pv<rea}s r]vayKa(rfj,evas roh Idiots avfi- 
iracrxet-v avrl tlov koivlov /cat roh [xepe<nv dvri tlov 6'Xojv. 

1 ii. 367-368. This argument occurs in a fragment imperfectly deciphered, 
but the meaning is quite clear. 2 i. 232-233. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 301 

In the exposition by Socrates of the degenerations from the 
best State, there is a certain "geometrical number" on which 
the goodness or badness of births is said to depend. Of this 
number the guardians will at some time fail to take account ; 
marriages will be wrongly arranged ; and, through the deterio- 
ration of offspring, the decline of the polity will set in. Here 
Proclus, as often, refuses to take Plato literally. He repeats 
a position we have already met with : the degenerations from 
the best State are not necessary phases in a historical process, 
but represent gradations in the actual continuous order of all 
things. The meaning of the formula is cosmical, not properly 
political. The best State, once established, could perish only 
by violence; for its citizens would choose to be completely 
destroyed rather than descend to a base, mode of life 1 . 

This made clear, Proclus allows himself some applications 
to the State considered as part of the whole. What the 
mysterious number indicates is that human life can never be 
entirely self-dependent. It is dependent finally on the astro- 
nomical order; and the total revolution of this would have its 
scientific expression, if that were discoverable, in a mathe- 
matical formula. As suffering from disease, in the case of 
those who have knowledge, comes almost exclusively from 
the cosmic system, not by their own fault, so dissolution comes 
to the best State. Its immediate cause he finds to be, as sug- 
gested by Amelius 2 , that the guardian sages, most apt and 
educated as they are for theory, that is, for the science of 
principles, miss the right appreciation of perception. For it 
is through perception that we have to learn the contexture of 
causes in the parts of the w r orld; reasoning here is fallible. 
This is eljjbapjxevrji external fate: the control of practice fails 
through the complexity of the order in its detail. 

The guardians, Proclus observes, did not receive all know- 
ledge as a gift, but were left, as wise men, to seek the appro- 
priate kinds themselves; as every order of being receives 
something from the order above and adds something of its 
own 3 . The legislator gave them the hint that, among other 
things, knowledge of the cosmic periods was needed. It was 
1 ii. 2, 16-20. 2 ii. 29-30. 3 ii. 74. 



302 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 

for them to discover and apply that knowledge. • Fallibility 
in the application of knowledge is latent in the system of 
causes. Everything in the world of becoming is unfolded in 
time; but not everything is unfolded at the right time for 
attaining the good that would arrive if its coming to be were 
concurrent with developments in the rest of the world making 
for its perfection 1 . Thus the impossibility of complete de- 
duction from the superior order of causes is recognised. Since 
Proclus cannot admit the emergence anywhere of something 
from nothing, this means, as has been noted before, that 
there is an element of explicit pluralism in his doctrine. In 
the present section of the Commentary, indeed, he once more 
repeats that if a root of discord had not been latent in the 
soul's being, discord could not have appeared in its lives 2 . 

In one passage of this section not otherwise remarkable, we 
come upon what I venture to say is a most indisputable 
example of progress in philosophy, — a thing of which the 
existence is often denied. However highly we may think of 
Proclus, we cannot put him, any more than he would have 
put himself, on a level with Plato in genius ; and still less can 
his age be compared with Plato's age as a social medium for 
dialectical discussion. Yet, out of a passing generality of 
Plato, after the continuous thinking of eight centuries, he is 
able to educe a statement of philosophical rationalism equal 
in precision to any that is to be found in Kant after the much 
longer but profoundly discontinuous period since. Know- 
ledge of truth, says Plato, is acquired by experience, judg- 
ment and reason 3 . Taking these three terms consecutively, 
Proclus defines experience as a kind of precursory knowledge, 
supplying matter to the judgment 4 . In judging, we ourselves 
1 ii. 79. 

3 ii. 49, 12—15: el 8e fii] irpovirripxev iv ry ovcria rrjs ^vxv* xal rrjs do~v/jL(pu)i>Las 
pi$a, tt?s (TVfMpwvias atcpdrov ko.1 fiSvrjs ovcrrjs, oi>5' b\v ev rah fwcus avrrjs dxpdrj kolI 
reus dwajxeaiv 5id<TTa<ris kolI duap/j.o<XTia. But down even to the lowest stage, 
symbolised by the iron race of Hesiod, there is imitation of reason: wairep 
ko1 aidijpos dfxvbpdv ^x eL vpos tov dpyvpov tt)s xpoas direi.KO.aiav p.€kas wv Kara 
to TrXecarov kclI yap to iradyTucbv £x ei <f>o-vraaiav fii/xetadai. vovv edeKovaav koI 
\6yov, dadevovcrav 8e did ttjv /zera ttjs v\t)$ evepyeiav (ii. 77, 14-18). 

3 Rep. ix. 582 A : efiireipia re ical <f>povfjaei. kclI Xoyy. 

4 The specialisation of <ppovr}<ns in this exact sense is due to Proclus, who 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 303 

project the bond of causation; experience declaring only the 
"that." Reason turns into an object of knowledge, and veri- 
fies, by using method, that which the judgment has discerned, 
thus making manifest the inward energy of the judgment 
itself 2 . 

We now proceed to the myth concerning the soul's destiny. 
For the detailed study of this, two speculative doctrines are 
postulated, viz., that there are separable souls and that there 
is a providential order 2 . Of these the first is regarded as 
demonstrable for the rational part of the soul, the second as 
capable of establishment by probable arguments. The prin- 
ciple of the opposite view is taken to be that the superior, 
i.e., reason and mind, is a product of the inferior, i.e., spon- 
taneous and irrational movement 3 . As a general argument 
against it, we are reminded of astronomical science, a sym- 
bolical account of which Socrates works into his narrative. 
The myth has for its aim to reinforce the idea that providence 
extends not only to the whole but to individuals 4 . 

Against those who would extrude myths altogether, Proclus 
argues that they are fitting for the instruction of souls like 
ours that are imaginative as well as intellectual. So much is it 
the nature of our souls to be imaginative that some of the 
ancient thinkers treated phantasy and intellect as the same, 
and some even who distinguished them denied the existence 
of any thought without imagery 5 . The mind that is insepar- 

declares it to be the critical power: 8i)Xov br/irovdev, ws &pa i) p.ev ws dXrjdQs 

KpiTlKT] TU)V 0VTQ)V TTJS d£(CtS ifTTLV 7) <pp6vT)0~(.S (ii. 82, 4-5). 

1 ii. 82, 6—14: Trporryeirai 8e TavTrjs [t^s (ppovrjcreus] i) tfnreipia, irp65po/JLos odcrd 
tis yvwcris /cat tt)v vXrjv Trap£x ovo ' a T V <ppopri<rei {Seovrai yap oi ip.<Ppov€s iabfievot 
t?)s e/iireipLas, d\\' ws vXrjs TrpovTTOK€ip.£vr)s, avroi rbv tt)s atVtas irpofteftXrjp.e'vot 
oecr/xov, TTji i/jLireipias p.bvov rb ' on ' Xeyoia-qt) • b 8e 8r] Xbyos e/c rpiruv, 8<ra 
Siiyvwicev i) (ppbvTjais, yvibpip.a noiel /cat TruTTovTai ae065ots xP'^aej'os, 6V uv 
ifj.<pavi£ei tt)v &v8ov ivepyeiav tt)s (ppov-qaeus. 2 ii. 101. 

3 ii. 102, 10-14: oi p.ev ovv Tip avTo/xdrcp /cat rrj t6xv t8 irdv iinTpeipavTes ovSev 
yiveadal <f>a<nv /card rrpbvoiav /cat Siiaqv, vovv 8t /cat Xbyov varepa woiovaiv rod 
avTOfiarov /cat yevvGscnv dirb tGsv x €l P° vuv T( * dp.eivova /cat e/c tQv dXbyws Kivovp-e"- 
vuv ra /card Xbyov ffivra. 

4 ii. 103, 4-5: oVt p-txP 1 T & v dro/xoiTaTuv oi puadol rrjs re 8i Kaio<r6vr)s eUrl nal 
rrjs dStdas, /cat oi) tcl oXa wpovoeirai fxbvov, dXXd nal rd ko.9' %Kao~Ta. 

5 ii. 107, 18-20: ware /cat twv Tra.Xat.Qv nvas tovs p.ev (pavrao-iav ravrbv elireu/ 
etvai /cat vovv, tovs 8e /cat 8caKpivavras d<pdvTaaTov vbycnv iJ.rjdep.iav dTroXeiireiv. 



304 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLTTS 

able from phantasy is not indeed the mind that we are, but 
it is the mind that we put on, and through this we take 
pleasure in myths as akin to it 1 . Myths are not themselves 
speculative truth, but they keep the soul in contact with 
truth. And they have an effect on the many. Else how is it 
that with the ancient myths and mysteries all places on earth 
were full of all kinds of good, whereas now without them all 
is devoid of the breath of life and of divine illumination 2 ? 

If the philosopher had been asked how he reconciled this 
with his optimism, he would doubtless have pointed to various 
implications brought out by him in the doctrine of cosmic 
cycles. Living in a period, soon to cease, of precarious philo- 
sophical liberty, he could still hint at what he meant, but no 
more. Even Sallust, the friend of Julian, in setting forth about 
a century earlier a creed for the reformed paganism, had put 
only in cryptic language his explanation of the change that 
had come over the world. The guilt, he says, that is now 
punished in some by total ignorance of the true divine order 
may be that of having deified their kings in a former life 3 . 
Thus it appears that in Julian's circle Christianity was re- 
garded as nemesis for the deification of the Emperors. We 
know that he himself had satirised the apotheosis in his 
Caesares. For Proclus, of course, this was all in the past; and 
he lived in a still older past. The Athenian democracy was to 
him a more living reality than the imperial monarchy; which, 
for anything he tells us, might not exist. 

In the part of the Commentary now reached, we are met 

1 ii. 107-108. 

2 ii. 108, 27-30: rj ttws fier' iicelvuv fxev was 6 irepi yijv tottos fxecrrbs r)v irav- 
ro'aov ayadQv, wy deol Trpo&vovaiv avdp&irois, apev 5e eneivwv airvoa iravra /ecu 
a/uLOipa rrjs tCov dedv eariu i-mXdfMxpeus ; 

Damascius, when the Byzantine age had closed in, has put on record 
philosophic opinion at the time in the form of a sketch of the three kinds of 
polity founded respectively on \6yos, dv/xos and eindvixla {Vita Isidori, 238). 
The first was realised in the Saturnian or Golden Age; the second in the 
military States famous in history; the third in the life to which the world has 
now run down, <pt,\oxpr)fJ.ova, jxiKpoTrpeirr), dovkeveiv dcrc/>aXcDs ideXcvcav, o'la tCjv 
ev rrj vvv yevecei irohiTevofieviov 77 far). 

3 See Hepl 6eQv /ecu koct/jlov, c. 18. The commentators note that adeta was 
the cryptic expression for Christianity. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 305 

by the question how far credulity about the marvellous, in 
Neo-Platonists like Julian and Proclus, who show some sym- 
pathy with it, actually extended. The reply, I think, must be 
that all the really confident belief they had was founded on 
what they took to be metaphysical demonstration; but that 
they were willing to indulge in fancies that there might be 
elements of truth in the many strange things commonly be- 
lieved. Thus Proclus brings in an account from Clearchus, a 
disciple of Aristotle, relating how a wonder-worker convinced 
the philosopher that the soul is separable by drawing that of 
a young man out of its body, and then bringing it back, like 
the doctor in Gautier's Avatar 1 . Generally, however, he is 
little given to anecdote; and, when we come to his scientific 
doctrine, we find the only shade of difference from that of 
Porphyry, for example, to be that he is even more strenuous in 
keeping it clear of dualistic animism. 

The departure of the soul from the body, like its entrance 
into it, is not to be regarded as a local motion ; for the soul is 
not in place, and not in the body as in a subject {viroKeifJuevw). 
Its "entrance" is the name given to a mode of relation 
(cr^eVt?); its departure, to dissolution of the relation 2 . This 
is conceived as in its inner reality a mode of psychical relation,, 
not as an association of two coordinated realities called soul 
and body. Soul contains in itself, as the prior reality, pre-exis- 
tent forms of all corporeal motions 3 . In modern language 
(occasionally used by Proclus) these last are purely pheno- 
menal. What draws it to the kind of life it attains is a certain 
emotion of sympathy and desire 4 . It finds its proper life and 
destiny, whether in this phenomenal world or in another, by 
a sort of spontaneous impulse without conscious choice 5 . Re- 
maining always the same in essence, it changes its lives 6 . 

1 ii. 122-123. 

2 ii. 125, 6—8: dXXd etcrodos p.kv aiirrji ij irpbs avrb KaXeirai crx&ru, 2£o5os 5e tj 
tt\% crx^ews airoXvais. 

3 ii. 125, 23-25: Traa-Qu yap tQ>v owjxaToaduv Kturjcreuy iv rfj faxv rd irapa- 
belyfxaTa Trpov(pe<TT7)Kev. 

4 ii. 127, 2-4 : 5ei yap to o/jlolov irav (pepecrdai rrpbs to o/xoiou, vikolv 8e iv Tats 
KLvrjaeaL to tikeovenTovv. 

5 ii. 128, 1 : olov ai/To/xaTOJS nai d7rpocu/oeTws. 

6 ii. 137, 13-14: /xfrovaa yap del t\ a\)TT\ Kara tt\v ovaiav e^aXXdrrei ras £wds. 

w. 20 



306 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLTJS 

Beneath Plato's mythological language, Proclus finds a 
meaning that places the supreme control above all personal 
agency. The judgment of souls does not really come to pass 
by a discourse of judges, but by a process running through 
the life itself of those that are judged and of the agents of 
destiny 1 . Justice itself is one 2 , but it takes multiplex form 
according to the variety of lives. The process by which it is 
realised, depending on the inward disposition to receive a 
certain impulse, the myth calls a command 3 . " God," " mind," 
"reason," "order," along with the perversion of reason and 
the disposition to excess of passion or appetite and to dis- 
order, are all latent in the soul. "Above" and "below," 
applied to the direction in which it goes, are merely analogical 
terms. The better souls know themselves and the providential 
destiny that leads them, the worse not 4 . 

The souls both from above and from below are represented 
as coming with joy to the world of birth; those from the 
underworld naturally, as having undergone penalties; but 
those from heaven also, because they have grown weary of 
the life there 5 . For even the souls in heaven desired the 
heavenly life only with one part of themselves. The other 
part, remaining unrealised {dvevepyr^rov), and desiring to 
realise itself, conveyed its weariness to the whole, and made 
it glad to see that which put birth before its eyes. This 
craving belongs not merely to that which as body is perish- 
able, but to the imperishable also. For the soul is a whole, 
with unexercised energies always latent; and the realisation 
of all of them at some time cannot fail 6 . 

To the heaven or intelligible world, the notion of an in- 
corporeal vision, as set forth by Plotinus, is applied with little 
modification. Recognition in that world is by renewal of 

1 ii. 145. 2 ii. 145, 18: /j.iav.../xovd8a deiav, ttjv dUrjv. 

3 ii. 146, 16: KeXevcnv irpoaeiirev 6 p-ddos. 

4 ii. 152. This is also the view of Plotinus; for similar positions compare 
pp. 66-7, above. 

5 ii. 159-160: rats ovpavicus odv K<xl reus x^ ov ' l0LLS V P-era^oKr] tjjj far}? a<jp.evr\ 
icrri, Kap.ovcra.is ev rah rporepais evepyeiais, reus p.ev ye etVorws, ev T\r}iradeLai.% 
otiaais, rais 5e, el Kal ev eviradeiais, d\X' airoKap.ov'o-ais teal Trpbs iKelpyv ttjv faty. 

6 ii. 162, 14-17. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 307 

memory ; the images of the past life having been deposited in 
the phantasy. This, however, is put quite generally: the re- 
markable theory of the separability of memory from the 
brain, which Plotinus had thought out in a very independent 
way in relation to the physiology of his time 1 , Proclus no- 
where discusses. The completely purified soul, he adds with 
Plotinus, at last puts aside all the impressions received from 
perception, and passes on to the state of intellectual intuition 2 . 
But this purification itself is only for a world-period, not for 
endless time. 

So, at the other extreme, the greatest of criminals, the 
tyrant, is punished for a whole cosmic period. The period of 
a thousand years of punishment or reward assigned to most 
souls between one birth and another is not to be understood 
as an actual period of which the portions can be counted, but 
as indicating a certain type of periodicity belonging to 
genesis 3 . The soul of the despot differs from the other souls' 
that are punished in being incurable for a whole great cycle 
of the world of birth. He cannot repent of his crimes, but 
can only try to escape 4 ; his escape being, in the myth, pre- 
vented by the closing of the egress and by certain demons. 
Repentance means self-accusation and the inward return to 
a right mind before there is external justice: when it does not 
arise from within, it has to be brought about by the agency 
of the whole world-order. This is figured by the tortures to 
which Ardiaeus is subjected. Ardiaeus will never come to the 
upper earth again ; but, as he began to be bad in time, he can 
cease to be bad in time; being immortal, he cannot be de- 
stroyed; and at last salvation will be brought to him by the 
Whole 5 . 

Passing to the astronomical symbolism, which comes next, 
Proclus interprets the "pillar of light" as signifying the cor- 

1 See above, pp. 47-8. 2 ii. 177, 26-29. 

3 ii. 169, 5-8: \eyeadw /ecu wap' r)fiCjv tj x^&s ot/ceios ns d/ncfyios elvcu reus 
dirb yeveaeus aTeWofxevats els yevtaiv \f/vx<us, T~pb ttjs reAetas, d>s dirofxev irporepov^ 
airoKaTacrT&aeus. 

4 ii. 180, 6-8. 

5 ii. 178. Cf. ii. 184, 26-28: /ecu ei fiy flatus reXews ctTroXe'crtfcu to adavarov, 
eaurtp fiev a7r6\\vTcu, reus 5e dirb tCjv 6\u)v eis avrb KadrjKOvaiy <ryferca. 

20—2 



308 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLT7S 

poreal, unmoved, indivisible, all-inclusive place of the uni- 
verse, — a view suggested by Porphyry 1 . This plenum of space 
is not to be conceived as incorporeal, since it has parts that 
can be marked off from one another (though not actually 
separated) and so is not all in each part, like true incor- 
poreals 2 . 

The Necessity that involves all things in its order and gives 
them their revolution is not that of Matter, which is at the 
remotest extreme from active causation, but is the divine 
necessity of Mind. This, the Mother of the Fates and disposer 
of all, the theologians call Themis, which it is unlawful to 
attempt to transgress, and which cannot be transgressed 3 . 
The . adamant in the composition of the distaff that spins 
round upon the knees of the goddess signifies the indissoluble 
character of intellectual necessity 4 . 

As if to correct the impression that this is conceived as a 
mere "abstract unity," Proclus notes with emphasis that the 
impulse to knowledge contains in itself the effort to distin- 
guish and pluralise as well as to unify 5 . 

Discussing again the question about the epicycles and 
generally the complicated mechanical hypotheses of the later 
astronomers such as Ptolemy, he expresses admiration of 
Plato for not introducing them ; but excuses the astronomers 
on the ground that, although the mechanisms do not actually 
exist, such hypotheses are necessary aids to calculation 6 . As 
against the view that they are real, his criticism is here more 
stringent than elsewhere. The hypotheses are not only in 

1 ii. 196. 

2 ii. 198, 7-10: r) dcrufiaTos e<jTiv [6 rbtroi] r) awfiartKos. dXX' dcrufxaros fiev 
ovda.fj.Cos elvat dvvarai.' to re yap x <j} P lffTOV cwfiaTos SKov iravraxov eariv, 6 de 
tottos oi>x °^os Travraxov. 

3 ii. 207, 21—22: 171' to virepfiaiveLV eyx^povv dQep.iTOvp.ev elvai \eyofiev, xnrep- 
fHaiveiv de op.u)S p.7] dvvaadat.. 

4 ii. 211-212: koI yap to SlKvtov /ci/ptwrara 777s voepds tjv idiov ovcrias el odv 

top addfiavTa aupdrj/xa ttjs a\{iTOV olrjTeov oiaias . . .tovtov dv d'77 vovv re 6eo\o- 
yovvTas Xeyeiv /cat dSd/xavra fivdoXoyovvTas. 

5 ii. 225, 11-14: ical yap 7? yvQcris kol tov ovtos eTropeyeTai. /cat Trjs £"«??$, 5lotl 
Kiurjcris rts ecrTiv, /cat ttjs eTepoTTjTos, diaKpiveiv edfKovca rd ovTa /cat ov fiovov iic 
toWCov ev, dXXd /cat iroXXd iroieZv e£ evbs. 

6 ii. 233-235. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 309 

themselves irrational; they do not even save the appear- 
ances 1 . The true rule of method is the Pythagorean precept, 
to bring the apparent anomalies in the celestial motions to 
uniformity by the fewest and simplest hypotheses 2 . Why not, 
he asks, anticipating Bruno, let the stars move of themselves 
unimpeded by their medium and without the aid of external 
devices? The actual motions that calculators have to treat 
as compositions of simple motions are not thus composed, but 
belong to kinds of their own 3 . 

On the " choice of lives" in the myth, Proclus develops in 
more detail the solution of the traditional problem concerning 
fate and free-will already stated by Plotinus. This contains 
in a subtler form the doctrine of the "intelligible character" 
taken over from Kant by Schopenhauer, who himself dis- 
covered and pointed out the anticipation of it in Proclus. 
The general statement of the modern theory is that in the 
timeless order, before the phenomenal life of the person, a 
character is fixed by an act of will that might have been other 
than it was. When the character becomes manifest in the 
phenomenal world, all events in its life proceed as determined 
according to laws of natural causation ; yet in reality it is free, 
because it once for all determined (or, more exactly, always 
determines) itself. The theory of Proclus is subtler in two 
ways: first, the notion of "choice" is not left as if it meant 
here or anywhere pure undetermined volition by which any 
mind or will might have become anything that it simply chose 
to be; and, secondly, the identity of the person to whom a 
particular life comes to be assigned does not exclude the power, 
within certain limits, to modify the character. This will be- 
come clearer in a fuller statement. 

The postulates of Proclus are the same as those of Kant and 

1 ii. 229-230. 

2 ii. 230, 3-5: 5t' ekaxlcrTwv ical airXovardruv virodiaewv xPV va i T V V </> aiv0 ~ 
fiivt)v av(>)/j.a\iav tuju ovpavlwv direvduveiv els 6fj.a\6T7jra Kal ra^iv. Cf. in Alcib. 
I. 425, 6-10: ras virodeaets Travraxov tQv \6yuv iXaxlcrras elvai 8et Kal airkowTa- 
Tas' 6Vy yap av /xaWov uai rotalde, Tocrotirct) rijs aw-trode'rov Xeyofie'urjs i-mcrTr] /ultjs 
iyyvraTU) Tvyx&vovcnu o%<rai. 

3 ii. 234, 13-14: etceLvwv toioOtwv ovauv Kad' avras acrvvdeTwv, oi'as ovtol 
iroiovcn Sta avvdecreus. 



310 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLTJS 

Schopenhauer. Individual choice must exist if we are to be 
anything; but it must be consistent with universal causation. 
If all the links of causation in the series of events in a life 
could be traced, it is true that all would end in necessity 1 . 
The causation, however, would be incomplete if the soul's 
original nature were not taken into account 2 . The reality be- 
hind the myth of the soul's antenatal choice is that each soul 
has a distinctive nature of its own, from which choices pro- 
ceed that would go otherwise if the soul were different. This 
essence of the individual is itself timeless, but it manifests 
itself by choices in time. In the myth there is not one life 
given without choice to each, nor are all lives offered to each 
indiscriminately 3 . This excludes at once fatalism and chance. 
The souls that in the myth are said to take the first places by 
lot, and therefore to have most choices of lives, are not to be 
conceived as taking their places in reality by chance-distri- 
bution. The real order is that of discriminating justice accord- 
ing to rank in the universe 4 . Those that come first are the 
better-endowed souls. When it is said that the rank of the 
soul is not inherent in it {tyvxvs $£ ra%iv ovk iveivai) 5 this does 
not mean that the soul has no intrinsic nature, but that its 
acquired character is not fixed by its nature, but is consequent 
on the mode of life chosen 6 . The best-endowed souls do not 
necessarily use the best judgment: in the myth, the first in 
order chooses ill, the last well. And even when the choice has 
been made, and the type of life fixed with its events 7 , it is not 
determined as good or bad; the soul can live well or ill within 
it 8 . In short, Proclus had the idea of those modern deter- 

1 ii. 275, 17—19: /cat ovrus Zoacev /cat irav to ivdexo/aevov els ava-yKaiav jxera- 
TiTrreiv dtivafjuv dia rrjs d/coXov0tas, /cat tG>v ivdexofieviov dpayKaicos evSexo/JLevois 
dXXots eTo/xev&v. 



276. 



3 ii. 263, 5-8: Xet7rerat to'lvvv fxrjre eubs vporeLvo/xevov ira.Ga.is prp-e iravroiv 
ir&aais tovs irporeivo/x^vovs fiiovs tivcls elvai rats ^vxaTs kcu aWovs dXXats. Cf. ii. 
264, 18-19 : otfre els tis fxia jSt'os airoveixerai tQv \pvx&v oijre iravres 6/iot'ws iracrais, 
aXKa rives riaiv. 

4 ii. 273-274. 5 Rep. x. 618 b. « ii. 284. 

7 ii. 275, 15-16: evedtx 67 " 7<*P Ka -i aXkov fiiov frrjv, dXXd irpb tt)s alpiaews, fxera 
8e T7)v aipecip abuvarov. 

8 ii. 266, 23-26, 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 311 

minists who make personality something deeper than charac- 
ter. Character he holds to be still plastic to inward impulses ; 
so that, while the soul had never open to it all choices without 
limit, it never loses the power of choice consistent with its 
limitations. 

The "daomon" assigned to each presides over a kind of 
life 1 , and is not to be imagined as the guardian spirit of one 
soul alone. What appears as chance coming from outside is 
part of the whole destiny of the soul, and is pre-determined 
like the rest 2 . Mind and reason are from God (Oeodev), or are 
the divinity in us 3 . If we do not choose in accordance with 
them, the fault is not in God, but in our individual determina- 
tion; and this is the meaning when it is said, atria eXofxevov, 
deo<$ dvaiTios*. 

Plato represents the first to choose as seizing upon the most 
absolute despotism. This illustrates the rule that the greatest 
evils are done by the best-endowed souls through grasping 
indiscriminately at the whole 5 . By a partial anticipation of 
Descartes, the cause is said to be, along with the blinding of 
the understanding, the infinity of the will 6 . And here Proclus 
starts a speculation of which he accentuates the audacity by 
drawing attention to it 7 . The fall of spirits in its typical form, 
he argues, is symbolised by the first god imagined as a king 
ruling by despotic compulsion 8 . In accordance with this 

1 ii.- 272, 20 : iroKk&v els dpx^i tCop 6fiioei8Qs favrwv. 

2 ii. 282, 12-15: on 5e 6 (ZLos oil fxbvov to eldos ix el T V S &V S , dXXd kclI ret 
dicokovda eKaaru) trapd tou iravTos dirove/j.6pLeva, 7roXXd/cts "fjdrj Trpoe'nrofiev. 

3 ii. 280, 6—7 : otide yap dXXws evepyovenv els rjfjias ol xpeiTTOVs tj/awv 77 l-vdodev. 

4 Rep. x. 617 e. 

5 ii. 297, 1-5 : /cat 6'Xws tt&vtuv t&v /jieydKwv kclkwv at irpdZeis V^X^" e ' Lfflv 
iieyaKiQ piev (pvaei XP W 1 J ^ VWV KaL cvcpvGiv, 6V evvolas Be ddiapdpwTovs e%epya£op.evwv 
tol fieyiara twv Aca/cw^ (/ecu e'Cp-qrai. rjpuv 6 \6yos /cat ev ctXXotj 7roXXd/as). 

6 ii. 291, 11-14 : rd ixev ovv atria rrjs TOiavTrjs rpayepdias elvai (p-qaiv cuppoavvyv 
/cat \aijxapylav, c5f 77 p.iv evTi rrjs yuwaTiKrjs dwdfxeojs rij(p\w<ri$, 1* de rrjs opet-ews 
dirtpavTOS £/cTa<rty. 

7 ii. 297, 6 : el XPV roX^tTjcraj/ra eiiretv. Cf . ii. 298, 9 : dXXd raura /xev etivToixa 
Keiadw. 

8 This occurs in an imperfectly deciphered passage (ii. 297-298), but there 
is no doubt about the interpretation. The god in whose history the symbolism 
is found is Cronos, who seized the kingdom from his father and afterwards 
devoured his own children, — a misfortune assigned*by Plato to the soul that 



312 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLTTS 

exemplar, the souls that come from heaven have acquired 
their tyrannic phantasy from beholding the powers one above 
another that govern the world of birth; forgetting that, for 
power to be rightly used, it must, as in heaven, be conjoined 
with goodness and intellect 1 . The particular soul whose 
destiny was so unfortunate, Proclus recalls from Plato, had 
in its previous life lived virtuously in an ordered State, but 
by habit, without having studied philosophy. And so, he 
generalises, having taken the upward path without the exer- 
cise of their own intellect, such souls are unable to recognise 
in heaven the intellect in accordance with which power deter- 
mines the order of the whole; for like is known by like 2 . 

Plato's observation that most choices are determined by 
the custom established in the previous life 3 , leads to a dis- 
quisition on the modes in which certain customs or laws rule 
the periods of human history. In this passage 4 there is at 
least an adumbration of the view that tradition changing from 
age to age is characteristic of human society, in distinction 
from the stability of the cosmos on one side and of animal 
habit on the other. 

When the metempsychoses 5 of heroic souls like those of 
Orpheus, Ajax and Agamemnon into animals are described, 
Proclus declares this, taken literally, altogether absurd; especi- 
ally as coming from Plato, who in the same work cries out 
against the poets for letting the heroes, while they are in the 
body, feel as men 6 . In the myth, adoption of the life of a 

grasps at the tyranny. On the "fall" in general, compare ii. 296-297: evel 
Kal rb rrj /xeyicrTrj tQv rvpavvlbtav etrirpex^v airoTTTUiais eanv TotaiJTTjs twos faj7}s 
rijs iravTa tov kogixqv bioiKotiarjs, rjs exovaa (pavraaiav virofyeperai irpbs rrjv TOLavbe 
iroWQv apxovaav fiera dvdyKrjs bvvan.iv. 

1 ii. 301, 18-23: iotKaai be Kal tt)v pavraaiav radrrjv exeiv rr\v TvpavviKyv at 
e£ ovpavov, deaaa.is.evai. ras tQv ovpaviuv dpxas Kal bvva.fj.eis KvfSepv&aas iraaav rr\v 
yeveaiv Kal aWas dWwv pei^ovs Kal bvvar dire pas, odev Kal aural bwdp-eus icpievrai- 
beovros yiyv&GKeiv, otl Trap' eKeivois p.ev rd rpla avveanv, ayadorys bvvap.is vovs. 
Cf. ii. 326, 15-16: eirel Kal to rvpavviaiv eiriTpix i£LV $<■& T ^ Kparrj tGjv ovpaviuv 
iyyeyovev reus 4£ ovpavov Kanotiaais. 

2 ii. 326, 19-25. 3 Rep. x. 620 A. 4 ii. 305-308. 

5 It is of interest for the philologist that the actual word, p.erep.^v'xuo'is, 
which has been treated as doubtful Greek, occurs in this commentary of 
Proclus (ii. 340, 23). 

6 ii. 312-313. 



THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLUS 313 

swan, a lion or an eagle signifies the predominant use of some 
power that we have in common with other animals, instead of 
the power of reason by which man is distinguished. The 
animals into which the heroes transmigrate symbolise their 
respective modes of life, — the musical (Orpheus), the brave 
with wrathful feeling (Ajax), the kingly (Agamemnon), and 
so forth 1 . The most distinctive portion of the interpretation 
refers to Orpheus. A soul resembling in type the divine or 
heroic soul of the singer and lover can descend to a life sym- 
bolised by the form of a swan because music has in it an appeal 
to irrational passion. Irrational animals also can be charmed 
by it, whereas none can philosophise. From the lapse into the 
irrational, the soul can be preserved only by philosophy, with 
its proof that neither hearing nor seeing gives accurate know- 
ledge, but that for this we must take reason and mind as our 
guides. Music and love take the senses, though at their 
highest. Only when accompanied by philosophy can they 
lead the soul upward. 

On the nature of irrational souls themselves, I find the 
teaching of Proclus to the end uncertain. An Orphic fragment 
quoted by him 2 gives a clearer statement than he himself ever 
makes. Simply as dogma, it perfectly agrees with the dis- 
tinction reasoned out by Leibniz between the mere "metem- 
psychosis" of animal souls conceived as perceptive monads, 
and the immortality — that is, continuity of memory and con- 
sciousness — to be attributed to monads at the stage of " apper- 
ception." The souls of animals too are conceived as permanent 
individuals going on to shape for themselves new bodies. 
This was no doubt the view of Plotinus; but it is not de- 
finitely that of Proclus. For him, only rational souls are 
certainly both individual and immortal ; though these, as we 

1 ii. 315-317. Cf. ii. 310, 9, where Proclus finds a point of contact for this 
view in Plotinus: cf. Enn. in. 4, 2: 8<roi 8e alad-qaei p.bvov e'faaav, ffia. d\\' 
el fiev aladrjaeL fierd dvfiov, ra dypia....Tovs 5e <pi\ofxov<rovs fiev, Kadapiovs 8e rd 
dXXa, els tol (jSticd' tovs 8e d\6yo)s (3acn\eas [ei's] derovs, el fiT] dWrj /ca/ci'a Trapeli). 

As we have seen in the Commentary on the Timaeus, he does not deny the 
possibility of attachment (imagined as penal) to an animal life; but he 
absolutely denies that a human soul can become the soul of a brute. 

2 ii. 339 (Ft. 224). 



314 THE COMMENTARIES OF PROCLTJS 

have seen, are not, even in their immortal part, purely 
rational 1 . 

In going on, after these speculative discussions, to end the 
Commentary, he lays stress on the warning against drinking 
too deep of the Lethe that symbolises descent to the world of 
birth. Our task must be, by purification from the passions 
incident to this, to restore our memory of the truth of being. 
This was appropriate in pages dealing with the close of the 
Republic. Yet the more distinctive thought of Proclus, run- 
ning through this and other commentaries, seems to be that 
for the perfection of the universe and of each soul all possi- 
bilities must be realised, and that the possibilities of a soul 
can be completely realised in no one life, even when it chooses 
and finds the best. 

1 Incidentally, he interprets Aristotle as teaching, with Plato, that there 
is a limited number of souls individually immortal; but the immortal part 
for Aristotle, he points out, is only the potential intellect. See ii. 338, 25-27 : 
to b~k bfidkoyei ccup&s, orav X^yrj irepl tov bvv6.fj.ei pov' /ecu ' tovto fxbvov ' tQp ev 
T)fXLv adavarov. 



INDEX OF NAMES 



Aedesius, 121, 131, 132, 133 

Aenesidemus, 32 

Aeschylus, 2 

Agathias, 182 

Alcibiades (in Dialogue), 242 ff. 

Alexander of Aphrodisias, 157 n., 
266, 290 

Alfred the Great, 186 

Alypius, 121, 122 

Amelius, 28, 33, 35, 99, 109, 301 

Ammonius Saccas, 26, 28, 31, 32 

Ammonius (pupil of Proclus), 184 

Anaxagoras, 10, 23 

Antiochus Epiphanes, 108 

Antoninus, M. Aurelius. See Aurelius 

Antoninus (Neo-Platonic philo- 
sopher), 132 

Apollonius of Tyana, 22, 113, 115 n., 
137 

Aquinas, St Thomas, 191, 193 

Archer-Hind, R. D., 71 n., 183 n. 

Archimedes, 226 

Aristophanes, 23, 216, 292 

Aristotle, 3n., 7 n., 8, 10, 11, 12 r 
13 n., 15, 18, 19, 20 n., 22, 23, 
33, 41 n., 43, 46, 51, 52, 54, 56, 
70, 72, 73, 91, 92, 96, 101, 105, 
110, 118, 124, 132 n., 156 n., 157, 
158, 161 n., 179 n., 183, 186, 188, 
189, 195, 205, 212, 217, 222, 225, 
232, 246, 253, 258, 267 n., 273, 
276, 277, 278, 282 n., 283 n., 287, 
290, 296, 300, 305, 314 n. 

Asclepiodotus, 184 

Atticus (Platonist), 274 

Augustine, St, 185, 192, 196 n. 

Aurelius, M., 3, 4, 32, 274 

Avicebron (Ibn Gebirol), 194 

Bacon, Francis, 200, 232 
Bacon, Roger, 194 
Baeumker, CI., 71 n. 
Bardesanes, 120 



Benn, A. W., 11 n., 14, 71 n., 205 

Berkeley, 29, 40, 49, 50, 201, 202, 264 

Bigg, C, 36 

Boccaccio, 194 

Boethius, 110, 186, 238 

Bosanquet, B., 90 n f 

Bouillet, M. K, 192 n. 

Bruno, Giordano, 21, 196, 197, 198, 

214, 251 n., 277, 286, 287, 309 
Brutus, 3 
Burnet, J., 7 n., 9 m, 266 

Caesar, 3, 252 

Caligula, 4 n. 

Cambyses, 1 n. 

Campanella, 198 

Carneades, 118 

Cato the Censor, 120 

Cato of Utica, 3, 12 n. 

Celsus, 136, 139, 144 

Chaignet, A. E., 181 n. 

Chosroes, 182, 183 

Chrysanthius, 121, 132, 133, 134 

Chrysippus, 118 

Cicero, 1 n., 12, 27 n., 32, 186 

Claudius, 3 n. 

Clement of Alexandria, 26 

Commodus, 4 

Comte, 5 n., 159, 207, 208, 217, 218, 

222, 227 n., 232, 233, 266, 268, 

269, 293 n. 
Constantine,3,121, 122 n., 131, 141 n. 
Constantius, 131, 150 n. 
Critias, 266, 267 
Cudworth, 19, 199 
Cyril, St (Bishop of Alexandria), 144, 

145, 155 

Damascius, 180, 181, 182, 304 n. 
Dante, 6, 191-194 
Democritus, 9, 10, 198, 199 
Descartes, 8, 33, 43, 71 n., 198, 199, 
200, 201, 232, 311 



316 



INDEX OF NAMES 



Dexippus, 134 
Diocletian, 3, 137 
Diogenes (the Cynic), 138 
Diogenes (Neo-Platonist), 182 
Dionysius the Areopagite, 187, 188, 

191 
Diotima, 292 

Dodwell, H. (the elder), 122 n. 
Drummond, J., 35 n. 
Duns Scotus, 193, 194 

Empedocles, 10, 120, 210, 211, 

272 n. 
Epictetus, 138, 183 
Epicurus, 11, 27 n., 199 
Erigena, John Scotus, 187, 188, 194, 

203, 222 
Euclid, 225 
Eulalius, 182 
Eunapius, 27, 107, 108, 113 n., 121, 

122, 131, 132, 133, 134, 139 
Euripides, 21 
Eusebius (Bishop of Caesarea). 31, 

137 
Eusebius (Neo-Platonic philosopher), 

133 
Eustathius, 131 



Hierocles (of Alexandria), 31, 155, 

156 
Hierocles (Pro-consul of Bithynia), 

137, 144 
Hippocrates, 93 
Hobbes, 8, 198, 199, 206, 217 
Homer, 17, 95, 109, 148, 160, 231, 

237 n., 266, 297, 299 
Honorius III, 188 
Hugo, V., 299 n. 
Hume, 203 
Hypatia, 27, 155, 187 

Iamblichus, 15 n., 22, 26, 92, 109, 
121-131, 134, 155, 156, 163, 225- 

228, 264 
Innocent III, 224 
Isidore, 181 (not identical with the 

"Isidorus" mentioned at p. 182) 

Jerome, St, 108, 132 n. 
Jowett, B., 222 n., 242 
Julian, 3 n., 16, 108, 121 n., 122, 131, 

132, 133, 134, 135; ch. vm; 304, 

305 
Justinian, 144, 155, 157, 181, 182, 183 
Juvenal, 21 



Ficino, Marsilio, 195, 196 
Firmus, Castricius, 113 

Gallienus, 28, 29 

Gautier, Th., 305 

Gibbon, E., 132 n., 181 

Goethe, 198 

Gordian, 28 

Grote, G., 132 n., 242, 287 

Hadrian, 117 

Hatch, E., 18 n. 

Hegel, 203, 204, 233, 253 

Heraclitus, 9, 35, 36 n., 72, 267, 

272 n. 
Herennius, 31 

Hermes Trismegistus, 220, 221 
Hermias (of Alexandria), 184 
Hermias (of Athens), 182 
Herodotus, 1 n., 2 n., 7 n. 
Hesiod, 17 n., 99, 302 n. 



Kant, 203, 222, 225, 258, 278, 302, 

309 
Keim, Th., 19 n., 137 n. 
Kepler, 286 
Ker, W. P., 238 n. 

Leibniz, 200, 203, 251, 252, 278, 

313 
Lipsius, R. A., 219 
Locke, 200, 201 
Longinus, 31, 33, 35, 72, 107 
Lucian, 21 

Lucretius, 11 n., 27 n., 199 
Lyall, A. C, 237 n. 

Macarius Magnes, 145 
Machiavelli, 6 
Macrobius, 186 
Maine, H. S., 4 n. 
Maistre, J. de, 15 n. 
Marcella, 108 



INDEX OF NAMES 



317 



Marinus, 143, 157-160, 180, 187, 

234 n. 
Marlowe, 266 

Matter, J., 26, 219, 220 n., 224 
Maurice, F. D., 135 n., 248 
Maximus, 133 
Melite, 132 
Milton, 266, 292 n. 
Mirandola, Pico della, 163 n. 
Moore, G. E., 275 n. 
Morbeka, William of, 161, 234 
More, H., 199 
Moses, 38, 139, 140, 145 ff. 

Nemesius, 185 

Nero, 4 n., 16 n. 

Neumann, C. J., 137 n., 144 ff. 

Newton, 199, 286 

Numa, 150 

Numenius, 33-38, 137, 156 n. 

Ockham, William of, 194 
Olympiodorus (teacher of Proclus), 

156 n., 157 
Olympiodorus (commentator on 

Plato and Aristotle), 156, 184 
Origen (the ecclesiastical writer), 26, 

31, 137 n., 196, 237 n., 298 n. 
Origen (Platonic philosopher), 31 

Parmenides, 9, 56, 215, 243; (in 
Plato), 248 ff. 

Pascal, 269 

Paul, St, 147, 150, 151, 152, 187, 191, 
222 

Pericles, 245 

Petrarch, 6, 194 

Phidias, 90, 272 

Philo Judaeus, 26, 33-37, 87 n., 105, 
137, 221 

Philoponus, 157 n., 182 n., 184 n. 

Plato, 3 n., 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 
17, 18, 19, 22, 23, 24, 27, 34 n., 
35, 36, 37, 38, 40, 41, 43, 46, 52, 
54, 55, 70, 71, 72, 83, 85 n., 87, 
90 n., 92, 93, 95, 98, 99, 101, 105, 
106, 107, 116, 117, 121, 122, 124, 
132 n., 134, 137, 143, 147, 155, 
156 n., 157, 160, 161, 162, 180, 



183, 195, 202, 205, 208, 213, 216- 
218, 224, 225, 228; Supplement, 
passim 
Plotinus, 13, 24; chs. iv, v, vi; 107, 
108, 109, 110, 111, 112, 113, 

121 n., 123, 124, 134, 155, 156 n., 
157, 158, 162, 163, 170, 173, 181, 
185, 192, 193, 194, 195, 196, 197, 
198, 201, 202, 208-215, 220, 231, 
232, 234, 235, 236, 237, 240, 244, 
246 n., 252, 254, 255, 264, 272, 
273, 274, 277, 294, 295, 296, 306, 
307, 309, 313 

Plutarch (of Athens), 155-158 

Plutarch (of Chaeronea), 32, 71, 119, 
120, 274 

Pompey, 252 

Porphyry, 22; ch. iv passim; 45 n., 
56, 82, 92, 99, 100, 101, 103, 
105 n., 107-120, 121, 123, 129, 
134, 135 n., 137, 140, 144, 145, 
146, 155, 156, 161 n., 163, 186, 
192, 195, 196, 228 n., 274, 305, 
308 

Portus, Aemilius, 161 n. 

Posidonius, 220 

Preller, L. See Hitter 

Priscianus, 182 

Priscus, 133, 134 

Proclus, 19, 27, 34, 37 n., 110, 123, 
124, 134, 143, 144 n., 156, 157- 
180, 181, 182, 184, 187, 192, 205, 
208-215, 222, 225-228, 231-314 

Prohaeresius, 122 

Ptolemy (the astronomer), 231, 308 

Pythagoras, 7, 22, 110, 113, 120, 

122 n., 123, 129, 146, 226, 227 

Read, C, 208 n. 

Reinach, Th., 38 n. 

Reitzenstein, R., 219 ff. 

Renan, E., 4 n., 139 n., 183 n., 189 n., 
270 

Ritter, H. and Preller, L. (cited as 
R. P. The references are to 
Historia Philosophiae Graecae, 
7th ed.), 15 n., 20 n., 29 n., 34 n., 
38 n., 41 n., Ill n., 124 n., 162 n., 
181 n., 182 n., 210 n. 



318 

Roberts, W. Rhys, 31 n. 
Rogatianus, 28 
Rohde, E., 17 n. 



Sallust (Pretorian Prefect under 

Julian), 135, 304 
Salonina, 29 
Schopenhauer, 309, 310 
Scotus, John. See Erigena 
Scotus, John Duns. See Duns 
Sextus Empiricus, 32 
Shakespeare, 299 n. 
SheUey, P. B., 202, 298 
Sidney, P., 196 

Siebeck, H., 43, 52, 71 n., 205, 222 
Simon, J., 26, 37 n., 76 n., 83 n., 108, 

113 n. 
Simplicius, 182, 183, 210, 233 
Socrates (the philosopher), 10, 12, 18, 

27, 41, 143 n., 162, 205, 222 n., 

232; in Supplement as inter- 

locutor in Dialogues 
Socrates (ecclesiastical historian), 

155 
Solomon, 151 
Solon, 267, 269 
Sopater, 122 n., 131 
Sorel, G., 18 n. 
Sosipatra, 132 

Spencer, H., 213, 216, 217, 300 
Spenser, E., 202 
Speusippus, 156 n. 
Spinoza, 100, 161, 173, 200, 203, 

244 n., 255 n., 261 n., 293 
Stobaeus, 110, 156 n. 
Suetonius, 3, 4 n., 16 n. 
Swinburne, A. C, 241 
Synesius, 155, 187 
Syrianus, 156-158, 184, 248 



INDEX OF NAMES 



Tacitus, 3, 4 n., 139 

Tannery, P., 9 n. 

Taylor, T., 161 n., 192 n. 

Tertullian, 20, 185 

Thales, 205 

Themistius, 131, 157 n. 

Theodore of Asine, 134, 163, 265, 

290, 295 
Theodoret, 137 
Theodoric, 186 
Theodosius II, 144 
Theognis, 298 

Theophrastus, 115, 119, 276, 279, 286 
Tiberius, 4 n. 
Timaeus Locrus, 265 n. 

Vacherot, E., 26, 34 n., 83 n., 92, 

157 n., 197 n., 221 n. 
Valens, 133 
Virgil, 252 

Xenocrates, 121, 156 n. 
Xenophanes, 9, 20, 271 n. 
Xenophon, 12 
Xerxes, 1 n. 

Zeller, E. (The references are to 
Die Philosophie der Griechen, 
n. 1, 4th ed. : n. 2, m. 1, in. 2, 
3rd ed.), 12 n., 22, 32, 34, 35 n., 
71 n., 76 n., 83 n., 93, 101, 104, 
105, 110 n., 122 n., 131 n., 134 n., 
135, 156 n., 157 n., 158 n., 159 n., 
160 n., 162, 163 n., 181, 182 n., 
183, 184 n., 231, 235 n., 274 n. 

Zeno (the Eleatic), 250, 251 

Zeno (the Stoic), 12 

Zoroaster, 109 



CAMBRIDGE : PRINTED BY J. B, PEACE, M.A., AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS. 



BY THE SAME AUTHOR 

THE THEORY 

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ABSTRACT ETHICS 

Crown 8vo. pp. x + 126. Price 4s 6d net 
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CHAP. 

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II. Separation of Ethccs from Metaphysics 

III. End and Law in Ethics 

IV. The History of Abstract Ethics 
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VI. Abstract and Concrete Ethics 

VII. Metaphysical Conclusion 
Index 

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